Bleak House, Broadstairs

Name/Title

Bleak House, Broadstairs

Entry/Object ID

2017.83

Artwork Details

Medium

Watercolor on paper

Context

Credit Line: Purchased by the Canton Museum of Art

Made/Created

Artist

Frederick Childe Hassam

Date made

1889

Dimensions

Dimension Description

Frame Size

Height

17-1/4 in

Width

12-1/4 in

Dimension Description

Image Size

Height

13-1/2 in

Width

9-3/4 in

Interpretative Labels

Label

In the very background of this watercolor, slightly left of center, is Bleak House (formerly named Fort House). Bleak House is a prominent house in the United Kingdom on the cliff overlooking the North Foreland and Viking Bay in Broadstairs, Kent. It was built around 1801. Charles Dickens spent summer holidays at Bleak House in the 1850s and 1860s, and it was there that he wrote David Copperfield. It's fitting that the main subject of this piece - the woman in white in the foreground - is reading a book.