A more than 110-year-old painting has a new home at Gari Melchers Home and Studio at Belmont. The Harold W. Huntley, Jr. Living Trust has loaned the museum “Little Constance,” which artist Gari Melchers painted around 1900 in London. “Little Constance” is currently on view in the artist’s studio where it will appear periodically over the next five years.
Over Melchers’ long career he produced only a handful of children’s portraits, but his insight into their active lives and charming ways is evident in the deft and lively brushwork that characterizes Constance Creelman, the daughter of his friend Alice Buell Creelman. Creelman, an artist, journalist and art dealer, and Melchers first met in the late 1880s in Holland and became reacquainted at the turn of the 20th century.
Gari Melchers Home and Studio is a 28-acre estate and former residence of the artist Gari Melchers and his wife Corinne. The property, which is operated by the University of Mary Washington, is both a Virginia Historic Landmark and a National Historic Landmark. Located at 224 Washington St. in Falmouth, Va., a quarter mile west of the intersection of U.S. 1 and U.S. 17, it is open daily with an admission charge. The museum also serves as the official Stafford County Visitor Center. For directions and other information, call (540) 654-1015 or visit the museum website at http://garimelchers.umw.edu.
News release prepared by: Michelle Crow-Dolby
