Extraordinary Gifts: Selected Paintings from The Procter and Gamble Collection at the Cincinnati Art Museum February 15, 2003 to September 12, 2004 Extraordinary Gifts: Selected Paintings from The Procter and Gamble Collection at the Cincinnati Art Museum Cincinnati Art Museum logo
A Word from P&G - Overview of Extraordinary Gifts: Selected Paintings from The Procter and Gamble Collection at the Cincinnati Art Museum Cincinnati Painters and the Big Picture - discusses how Cincinnati Artists fit into a larger art historical perspective The Works from The P&G Collection - themed galleries of the works in the show Index by Artist Name - a list of all the artists represented in the show and the works they completed Go back to the Cincinnati Art Museum Home page
Alexander Wyant (1836–1892)
Cascades, ca. 1867
oil on canvas
48 x 36 in.

Born in rural Northeast Ohio, Wyant left his career as a sign painter in 1857 after visiting an art show in Cincinnati. Inspired by what he saw, he moved to the Queen City to pursue a career as a professional landscape painter. With the aid of the patronage of Nicholas Longworth, a prominent local businessman and art connoisseur, Wyant studied art in both New York and Europe.

Cascades was painted after his return from Europe. Wyant rarely included figures in his compositions, yet in this view a fisherman and his dog pause near a heavily wooded stream. Specializing in landscapes, Wyant explained his love of nature in a letter to his father, written in 1866, “Everything I learn opens my eyes to dozens of things which I had not before thought of. It is much like walking through a thick wood occasionally getting a glimpse of a beautiful opening beyond. The nearer you approach it the more beautiful vistas reveal themselves to you, until at last you may stand upon the border.”