East Main Street Looking West
Artist
Kenneth Harris
(American, 1904-1983)
CultureAmerican
Date1951
MediumWatercolor on paper
DimensionsOverall, Image: 19 3/4 x 27 1/2 in. (50.2 x 69.9 cm)
Overall: 21 1/4 x 29 5/8 in. (54 x 75.2 cm)
Overall, Mat: 30 x 37 in. (76.2 x 94 cm)
Overall, Frame: 31 1/4 x 38 1/4 in. (79.4 x 97.2 cm)
Overall: 21 1/4 x 29 5/8 in. (54 x 75.2 cm)
Overall, Mat: 30 x 37 in. (76.2 x 94 cm)
Overall, Frame: 31 1/4 x 38 1/4 in. (79.4 x 97.2 cm)
InscribedSigned and dated lower left: KHarris 1951
PortfolioPortrait of a City series (Norfolk, VA, 1950-51)
Credit LineMuseum purchase, Norfolk Newspapers' Art Trust Fund
Object number51.45.7
Not on view
DescriptionThis is a watercolor on paper painting. It is one of thirty in a series titled _Portrait of a City_. In this painting, the viewer looks down a city street scene; on the right side people walk on the sidewalk - most of them wearing coats - where there are a variety of shops. On the left side, residential buildings are visible in various states of disrepair; nobody walks on that side of the street in the scene. Cars line both sides of the street.Label TextKenneth Harris American (1904-1983) East Freemason and Fenchurch Streets, I Remember-I Remember, 1950 East Main Street Looking West, 1951 Watercolors on paper Museum purchase, Norfolk Newspapers' Art Trust Fund 51.45.10 and 51.45.7, respectively In 1950, the Chrysler's forerunner, the Norfolk Museum of Arts and Sciences, commissioned local watercolorist Kenneth Harris to create a series of topographical views of the city. Entitled Portrait of a City, Harris's thirty watercolor views of Norfolk, including the two displayed here, were purchased by the Museum in 1952 and exhibited there to great acclaim. The series depicts not only Norfolk's architectural landmarks, coal piers, and railroad yards, but also several urban neighborhoods then slated for demolition, as the city began, in 1949-50, what would become the most sweeping example of "urban renewal" in post-World War II America. East Freemason and Fenchurch Streets records what was then one of the city's oldest sections, an area of handsome 19th-century brick row houses that had fallen into disrepair. By 1954 the neighborhood was being leveled. In East Main Street Looking West, Harris portrays another section of 19th-century townhouses that had formerly been a fine residential neighborhood but by 1950 had become an economically marginal area of small shops and taverns. Most of them would be demolished by 1961. Though Harris claimed his watercolors were straightforward documents and not works of art, Portrait of a City is indeed artful and often hauntingly poetic. Harris's touch is consistently deft, his palette rich and nuanced, and his stately compositions shaped through a masterful interplay of light and atmosphere. ProvenanceThe artist was commissioned to do these works by John David Hatch, the director of Norfolk Museum of Arts and Sciences, in 1950. The commission was funded with the Museum's Norfolk Newspapers' Art Trust Fund, which was established to purchase historic matter relating to Norfolk, Virginia. Norfolk Museum of Arts and Sciences Purchase, Norfolk Newspapers' Art Trust Fund, 1951; transfer to Chrysler Museum of Art, 1971. Exhibition History"Portrait of a City: Water Colors of Norfolk," Norfolk Museum of Arts and Sciences, Norfolk, Va., July 1952 - October 1952; twelve Southeastern locations, October 1952 - April 1954. Exhibited for Navy Relief Society Ball at Naval Operations Base Gymnasium, April 18-19, 1958. "Norfolk Story in Painting," Norfolk Arena, Va., October 25 - 27, 1968. Loan to Norfolk City, Building Inspector's Office, Norfolk, Va., November 1968. "Kenneth Harris Watercolors," Chrysler Museum of Art, Community Gallery, Norfolk, Va., September 22, 1998 - January 10, 1999. Published References_Portrait of a City: Water Colors of Norfolk_, exh. cat., Norfolk Museum of Arts and Sciences, Norfolk, Va., 1952, no. 23. _The Norfolk Story in Painting: A Twenty Year Pictorial History of Norfolk as Painted by Kenneth Harris_, exh. cat., Norfolk Optimist Club, Norfolk, Va., 1968. James C. Kelly and William M.S. Rasmussen, _The Virginia Landscape: A Cultural History_, exh. cat, Virginia Historical Society, Charlottesville, Va., 2000, 125. Martha N. Hagood and Jefferson C. Harrison, _American Art at the Chrysler Museum: Selected Paintings, Sculpture, and Drawings_ (Norfolk, Va.: Chrysler Museum of Art, 2005), 196-197, no. 124. ISBN: 0-940744-71-6
