Literature
Artist's Record Book I, p. 68, lines 31-32.
Lance Humphries, Daniel Garber: Catalogue Raisonné, Hollis Taggart Galleries, New York, 2006, Vol. II, cat. P 794, p. 276 (illustrated).

Note

The present work will be accompanied by a copy of a typed-out letter from Daniel Garber to Harold D. Saylor commenting the work, dated January 5, 1955.

After depicting a number of towns gently nestled in nature during the first two decades of his career, Garber turned to a new, more subtle type of landscape, revolving around off-centered houses. Completely isolated from civilization and represented in the middle of an expansive landscape, these houses were most often composed in the setting of overlapping hills, and surrounded by grazing farm animals. Such is the case of McGoldrick’s Farm (Lot 89) and Environs of Solebury (Lot 90), two paintings Garber executed in June 1944 and which he considered “two of the best I’ve ever painted in Solebury Village” (as stated in a letter to Harold D. Saylor, dated January 5, 1955).
Both painted during a warm, glowing afternoon which gave a very rich color to the trees around the buildings, the works feature typical, abandoned dwellings in the middle foreground (the home of Joseph D. McGoldrick in one case, an unidentified couple of barns looking down toward New Hope and Solebury School in the other), surrounded by a lush vegetation composed of elderberry and uncultivated fields of weeds. No human soul is in sight, everything seems tranquil. Automobiles, telephone and electric poles have been removed so that the viewer's attention is focused solely on the buildings and the animals. In each scene, both seem to dot the landscape in an organic way, as if their presence in the scene was both logical and irreplaceable. As a result, each scene stands as an idealized representation of nature, an idyllic and preserved America which Garber sought and found reassuring. “These compositions,” explains Lance Humphries, “encourage the viewer to engage directly in the narrative quality of the painting, and to travel these rural roads in search of the American ideal, as Garber clearly did in making them.” McGoldrick’s Farm and Environs of Solebury indeed speak to Garber's ongoing fascination for a simple, secluded way of life that does not involve too many human souls, and by the same token to his conscious rejection of big city life, especially Philadelphia - which he left in the early years of the century and visited only when necessary.
Both works were directly purchased from the artist by Harold D. Saylor, whom Garber had met in the late 1940s. Saylor was a prominent judge in the Philadelphia Orphan’s Court, and soon became an avid collector of Garber’s work, ultimately purchasing the largest number of paintings the artist ever sold to a single private collector. Saylor’s purchases included both the artist’s early work and later compositions. His continued patronage was an important late-career affirmation for Garber, whose fragile health and troubling heart conditions prevented him from painting as often.

Condition Report

Contact Information

Lot 89

Lot Description

Provenance

Condition Report

Contact Information