Hide and Seek

William Merritt Chase was the most influential American painter-teacher of the Impressionist generation, and Hide and Seek of 1888 is among his finest domestic interiors. Painted in his celebrated Tenth Street Studio or at his summer home, the image captures children at play — a fleeting, unselfconscious moment — with the Impressionist's conviction that such everyday beauty deserves the full attention of serious painting. Chase had studied in Munich and absorbed an Old Master tonal richness that he then infused with Impressionist freshness. The Phillips Collection acquired this as one of the great American Impressionist works.

Chase deploys a warm, rich interior palette — the dark paneling of the studio setting contrasting with the white-clad child — with a sophistication clearly learned from Dutch and Flemish masters. Brushwork is confident and varied: thick impasto in lights, transparent darks. The child's figure is luminous amid the surrounding darkness.