Mary Moran “Interior of a California Forest” Etching


Mary Moran was among several members of the New York Etching Club included Charles Adams Platt, Thomas Moran, Mary Nimmo Moran, Samuel Colman, Kruseman Van Elten, William Merritt Chase, Frederick Stuart Church, Stephen Parrish, Joseph Pennell, and Thomas Waterman Wood. For most members, etching was an important side-interest to their main occupation as painters.

The New York Etching Club held regular exhibitions through the early 1890s in which members and invited guests displayed their etchings for sale to the general public. From 1879 to 1881, works by members of the New York Etching Club were also featured in a periodical called “The American Art Review”. Published under the leadership of Sylvester Rosa Koehler, the first curator of prints at the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, it further popularized etching as a medium and the New York Etching Club as a professional organization. The success of the New York Etching Club helped spawn similar organizations in other major American cities in the late 19th century.

Mary Moran “Interior of a California Forest”, 1888. Recorded in the Klackner catalogue of Her Works, # 57. Signed in the plate.

Etched after a sketch by her husband, Thomas Moran. It was commissioned for publication in “Picturesque California,” a monumental two-volume publication of great renown. Plate signed by Both Thomas Moran and Mary Moran. Etching on fine antique paper measuring 9 by 13 inches in good condition.