Label TextYou can almost feel the warmth of the sun in this pastoral scene by American artist Edward Mitchell Bannister. The title, After the Bath, usually reserved for female nudes, here humorously refers to geese drying off near a pond. Influenced by the French Barbizon school, Bannister made rustic landscapes like this one, that revel in quiet moments.
A Canadian American artist whose father was from Barbados, Bannister became even more determined as a painter after he read a racist newspaper article in 1867, which stated that Black people could not make art. In 1876, Bannister became the first Black artist to receive a national award, which the judges attempted but failed to rescind upon discovering his race. Bannister became a leading painter in Providence, Rhode Island, where he lived, continuing to paint meditative scenes of the natural world.
(Yinshi Lerman-Tan, 2021)