My mother’s family has a great love for books. Visit any one of my maternal relatives, and you will not want for reading material. Over years of visits to my grandparents’ house, I made friends with many of the books in their extensive home library. Every time I’d go to their house, I’d find myself returning to certain favorites. Among the books I loved was The Brandywine Heritage, which features the art of Howard Pyle, N.C. Wyeth, Andrew Wyeth, and James (Jamie) Wyeth. I leafed through the book many times, looking at the pictures, but I never bothered to read the introduction.
The Brandywine Heritage was published by the Brandywine River Museum in 1971, the year the museum opened. The museum features the art of the Wyeth family and other area artists, including Howard Pyle, who founded the Brandywine School. If you know Pyle, you know that he was an outstanding illustrator active in the late 1800s and early 1900s. He taught several students who went on to have successful careers, among them N.C. Wyeth, also an exceptional illustrator. Three of Wyeth’s children — Andrew, Henriette, and Carolyn — went on to become artists themselves. (Neither daughter is featured in the book; to be fair, Henriette’s most famous work — a portrait of Pat Nixon — was painted several years after the book was published.) James, Andrew’s second son, also became an artist, studying under his aunt Carolyn.
I’m not recommending this book because of its size. I recently requested it through interlibrary loan and was shocked when I picked it up; I’d remembered it as much larger. It has 18 color plates and 80 black-and-white illustrations. Beyond the nine-page introduction, there is no narrative text. It also does not include Andrew’s most famous painting, Christina’s World. I had sworn I first saw the painting in this book, so that was another surprise.
Despite its small size, I still love this book, because it provides a fascinating look at four generations of artists. You can get a sense of that even without reading the introduction. But I finally bothered with the introduction this time, and I appreciated the opportunity to learn a little more about these artists.
Of course, the art is beautiful. You’ll find Pyle’s pirates and some of his illustrations that are themselves stories. Before the section on N.C. Wyeth’s art, there is a series of paintings completed by Pyle and his students, including a marvelous Canadian trapper viewed from a point somewhere near his feet. The section on the eldest Wyeth begins with drawings of Native Americans from the Southwest and includes some of his illustrations for Treasure Island. Andrew’s section includes engaging portraits and spare landscapes. The section devoted to James includes some of his studies of the Kennedys, his finished painting of JFK, and a number of paintings that focus on one thing: a bronze bell, a boat, the base of a tree trunk, a pig.
The Brandywine Heritage is out of print, which is a pity. It chronicles not only the work of four generations of painters but also the beginning of a museum. While experts on these artists may find that this book is not enough to satisfy them, people like me, who appreciate art but are not art historians, will enjoy exploring the chain of influence from Howard Pyle to James Wyeth.