This arresting watercolor is the first work by the nineteenth-century British artist William Fraser Garden to enter the Morgan's collection. The most gifted member of the Fraser family of artists, Garden spent most of his life away from major artistic centers, producing carefully observed and exquisitely executed landscapes which focused on his immediate surroundings. View of a Tree at Sunset exemplifies not only Garden's exceptional facility for the watercolor medium but also his ability to sensitively capture the changing quality of light. Here, the orange glow of the setting sun is contrasted with the more somber palette of grays, browns, and greens which dominate the rest of the picture, transforming a seemingly commonplace rural landscape into a theater of light.
Pei, Patricia, former owner.