Main Exhibit

gallery collection exhibit

picturesque (Eng), pittoresque (Fr), pittoresco (It)

European Watercolors by H. A. Dyer (1872 - 1943)

July 10 - August 16, 2013

Open for Gallery Night Providence, July 18th and August 15, 2013.
Exhibit catalogue available for purchase.

H.A. Dyer had a remarkable career as a Rhode Island artist in the early 20th Century. Most of that success was due to his relentless work ethic, painting close to 100 paintings a year, and steady European painting sojourns beginning in 1894 after his graduation from Brown University.

His watercolors log the fabulous journeys to Italy, France and beyond during his 45 year artistic career. In picturesque (Eng), pittoresque (Fr), pittoresco (It), Bert Gallery shows a collection of colorful pieces displaying an panoramic view of the Sorrentine Coast and the Bay of Naples as well as well-documented travels throughout the Normandy region of France. Additionally there are the purple-shadowed mountains of the Italian and Swiss Alps and a few rare pieces that display Dyer’s love of New England.

A descendent of the art inclined Hoppin family, Dyer graduated from Brown University and Rhode Island School of Design. No one instructor dominated in Dyer’s tutelage, rather it was the school of the “Old-style English method of watercolor painting” that the artist adopted. He was very adept at using both gouache and transparent washes on gray/earth toned watercolor sheets. This technique the artist considered paramount to his successfully rendered watercolors.

Dyer was successful in selling his work at annual Providence Art Club and Tilden and Thurber shows. Yearly sojourns to Italy, France, and England provided him with popular subject matter for Rhode Islanders unable to travel abroad. Dyer exhibited throughout the country during his lifetime, including such locations as Cleveland, Chicago, Denver, Rochester, Syracuse, Fall River, Madison and Providence. Examples of his work in public collections are, The Road that Leads them Home, a watercolor, in the collection of the Corcoran Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.; Marine, at the Providence (Rhode Island) Art Club; The Jungfrau, a watercolor, in the permanent collection Rhode Island School of Design, Providence, Rhode Island. In April 1897 he exhibited a watercolor Meadow Banks, at the Boston Art Club.