Fernand Harvey Lungren (1859–1932)

FERNAND HARVEY LUNGREN (1859–1932)
A Winter Wedding—Washington Square, 1897
Oil on canvas, 28 x 44 in.
Signed (at lower right): FERNAND LUNGREN

RECORDED: Grace Glueck, “History Unfolds in a Show on the Square (Washington Square, That Is),” New York Times, June 29, 2001, p. E34 illus. // Esther Crain, “A Winter Wedding—Washington Square,” Ephemeral New York, January 7, 2010 illus. in color // Tom Miller, “The 1832 Thomas Suffern House—11 Washington Square North,” Daytonian in Manhattan, October 27, 2021, illus. in color // Esther Crain, “What happened to the young couple who held an 1896 winter wedding on Washington Square,” Ephemeral New York, December 12, 2022 illus. in color

EXHIBITED: Hirschl & Adler Galleries, Inc., New York, 1991, Elegant Lives: European and American Art, 1875–1910, [n.n.] // Berry-Hill Galleries, New York, May 24–July 6, 2001, Homage to the Square: Picturing Washington Square, 1890–1965, illus. in color on cover (detail)

EX COLL.: G. W. Brown, Hampstead, England, until 1904, to sale, Christie's, London, Mar. 14, 1904, no. 94, as Paris in Winter, 4 Guineas; to Skand; [Springfield Fine Arts, London, England]; to [Hirschl & Adler Galleries, New York, 1987]; to private collection, 1993 until the present

In December 1896, the artist Fernand Lungren found himself witnessing front and center a social event that marked what was arguably the apex of the fading days of New York’s so called “Gilded Age.” From his studio at 3 Washington Square North, Lungren looked a few doors down the block to 11 Washington Square North, the stately home of Mr. and Mrs. Edward Neufville Tailer. On December 17, the Tailer’s youngest daughter, Francis (Fannie) Bogert Tailer (1864–1953) married Sidney Johnston Smith (1868–1949) in a glittering society wedding at nearby  Grace Church. Looking out from his studio building (or perhaps perched on the front stoop), Lungren watched as the luminaries of Mrs. Astor’s “Four Hundred” converged on the Tailer’s townhouse to convey congratulations (and gifts) to the newlyweds. Lungren, who by that time was producing a series of watercolors and pastels of southwest American scenes, reverted to his earlier interest in urban streetscapes to memorialize the event with a major oil canvas. A Winter Wedding—Washington Square offers a panoramic view of the Square, as the crowd of stylish visitors arrive in their horse drawn carriages as curious New Yorkers look on.