Interlude
1922
84 x 60 in. (213.4 x 152.4 cm)
Maxfield Parrish
United States
(Philadelphia, PA, 1870 - 1966, Plainfield, NH)
Object Type:
Painting
Medium and Support:
Oil on linen canvas
Credit Line:
Lent by the Eastman School of Music of the University of Rochester
Accession Number:
5.1997L
Location: Currently on view
Maxfield Parrish, leading illustrator and muralist of the early twentieth century, painted Interlude to hang at the Eastman Theatre in Rochester. Through architect Lawrence Grant White, George Eastman commissioned three murals for the theater, which served as both silent movie palace and philharmonic hall. Interlude was Eastman’s favorite, a “peacherina,” he wrote White.
The radiant quality of Interlude is due to Parrish’s high technical standards and theatrical sense of color—electrical reds, vivid purples, and lush apricots. A shade of cobalt straight from the tube was applied so ingeniously that it became known as “Parrish blue.” He painted glaze upon glaze to create a hard photographic finish that betrayed no brush strokes.
Interlude was moved to the Memorial Art Gallery in 1997 to provide it with more stable temperature and humidity conditions. In its place at the Eastman Theatre is a full-size color reproduction.
Elizabeth Brayer, George Eastman Historian
[Summer 2015]