Marsden Hartley

Marsden Hartley (1877–1943), Painting No. 69, 1917
Reverse oil on glass, 15 1/2 × 8 3/4 in. Alfred Stieglitz Collection, Co-owned by Fisk University, Nashville, Tennessee, and Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art, Bentonville, Arkansas. ASC.2012.64.

Reverse painting on glass is a centuries-old form, used by artists from a wide range of cultures and time periods. For this technique, the artist applies paint to the back of the glass surface, with the resulting image then viewed from the opposite side. Marsden Hartley admired European and American folk art reverse painting on glass from the nineteenth century. He experimented with the technique in a number of still life paintings.