William Glackens

William Glackens, May Day, Central Park, ca. 1904
Oil on canvas, 25 1/8 x 34 1/4 in. (63.8 x 87 cm); Frame: 34 x 39 in. (86.4 x 99.1 cm). Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco, Museum purchase, gift of the Charles E. Merrill Trust with matching funds from the M. H. de Young Museum Society, 70.11

Glackens was a realist at odds with artistic conventions. Here, his dashing brushstroke and rich, brilliant color to capture the rowdy hustle and bustle of this springtime celebration in New York's Central Park. Well-dressed children wrestle and play in the sunlight while, in the shade, a maypole teeters, largely ignored. The artist, who worked as a newspaper illustrator, is particularly successful in conveying the energetic play of the children in a spontaneous and vigorous style. William Glackens established his artistic reputation at the turn of the century with his modern depictions of urban life. He was born and raised in Philadelphia, where he took night classes at the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts while working as an artist-reporter for a local newspaper. He later moved to New York City, where he became one of the nation's premier commercial illustrators, a profession that provided him the stable income that enabled him to pursue painting.