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Union Square

Julian Alden Weir

American Art

On View: Luce Visible Storage and Study Center, 5th Floor
The Conservator's Eye

Set in Manhattan’s Union Square, this scene captures the urban street types and bohemian artists who populated the neighborhood.

Julian Alden Weir cut apart a larger composition titled In the Park sometime after it received harsh criticism at the 1879 Society of American Artists exhibition. One of three fragments, Union Square was cut in the shape of an oval and expanded into a rectangle through the addition of four spandrels, the triangular additions at the corners. Weir extended the composition onto the additions, filling in the sky and the bottom of the central figure’s fur muff. There is a tonal difference between the two generations of paint. This is because Weir matched the newer colors to a dirty varnish layer on the oval, which has since been cleaned away.
MEDIUM Oil on canvas
DATES ca. 1879
DIMENSIONS 29 7/8 x 24 15/16 in. (75.9 x 63.4 cm) frame: 41 3/4 x 36 3/4 x 5 3/4 in. (106 x 93.3 x 14.6 cm)  (show scale)
SIGNATURE Signed lower right: "J Alden Weir"
COLLECTIONS American Art
ACCESSION NUMBER 26.410
CREDIT LINE Museum Collection Fund
MUSEUM LOCATION This item is on view in Luce Visible Storage and Study Center, 5th Floor
CAPTION Julian Alden Weir (American, 1852-1919). Union Square, ca. 1879. Oil on canvas, 29 7/8 x 24 15/16 in. (75.9 x 63.4 cm). Brooklyn Museum, Museum Collection Fund, 26.410 (Photo: Brooklyn Museum, 26.410_SL1.jpg)
IMAGE overall, 26.410_SL1.jpg. Brooklyn Museum photograph
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