Vespers

In reaction to the industrialism and materialism of the modern age, a religious revival about 1900 reflected a general spiritual yearning among artists and their patrons. This painting shows a young Dutch woman walking to evening prayers, or vespers. She wears the typical Zeeland circular, colorful cape and white, transparent headdress that resembles a bridal veil. The religious subject and the detailed rendering of landscape and costume reveal the expatriate Hitchcock's strong dependence on French painters such as Jules Bastien-Lepage. Hitchcock's assimilation of Impressionism is revealed in the unconventional composition, interest in pattern, and intense palette.

Credit: Gift of Edward Drummond Libbey, 1917