Child Reading1915-1918
H. Lyman Saÿen painted this in 1915-1918, aged about 40. It is now at the Smithsonian American Art Museum in Washington, DC. More about this work
About this work
H. Lyman Saÿen painted this in 1915-1918, aged about 40. It is now at the Smithsonian American Art Museum in Washington, DC.
How it was made
- Watercolour
- Pigment in gum arabic, thinned with water and laid in transparent washes. Nothing white is painted: the light is the paper showing through.
H. Lyman Saÿen
born Philadelphia, PA 1875-died Philadelphia, PA 1918
Saÿen trained at the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts while working as an electrical engineer, patenting improvements to X-ray tubes. In Paris from 1906 he joined Henri Matisse’s classes and absorbed the bold colour of Fauvism. Back in Philadelphia from 1914, he was among the city’s earliest modernists, moving towards flat, decorative, increasingly abstract compositions in the few years before his early death.
Written by Ochre Editions.
Rights and the museum’s record
Public domain. The Smithsonian American Art Museum has dedicated this image to the public domain under CC0, so anyone may copy, adapt and use it, for any purpose, without asking. Our prints and files are reproductions made from the museum’s image; the museum doesn’t endorse them.
- Object number
- 1968.19.11
- Credit
- Courtesy of the Smithsonian American Art Museum
- Type
- Painting
- Department
- Graphic Arts
- Licence
- CC0 1.0 Universal
- Museum record
- See it on the museum’s site
