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“Something is always happening outdoors. Be on the lookout. Take notes on the spot—what you see may happen only once.” - Aldro T. Hibbard Aldro T. Hibbard’s opinions on art were as forceful and assured as his paintings. As John L. Cooley (a career journalist and Hibbard’s longtime neighbor who wrote a biography of the artist in 1968) remarked: “Aldro Hibbard was not an arm’s length painter.” What he meant was this: when Hibbard wintered in Vermont (an already unforgiving choice) and wanted to paint a freshly fallen foot or so of snow, he would rise before the sun, drink a pot of coffee, strap some snowshoes to his feet, and hike deep into the woods in sub-zero temperatures until he found precisely the right light, colors, and setting. So when Hibbard decided to dedicate the rest of the non-Vermont months of the year to the seaside town of Rockport, Massachusetts, after visiting for the first time in 1919, it wasn’t some haphazard decision. He saw something worthwhile and striking in its character, and he wanted in. Well that, and he’d heard there was a decent baseball team he could play for there. Autumn in Rockport finds us on a sleepy, tree-lined street, a woman and child its lone occupants, the town evidently emptied out of its summer crowds. It’s an image of the cusp of fall, but a tricky one—things are still verdant, just a few timid leaves having quietly flipped to brown. The real hint of the turning season is in the drama of the light. Gone is the buttery palette of July afternoons, replaced instead by deep green against a stark blue sky, crisp slashes of cold and broken sun falling across white and yellow facades and steeples. They’re small tells, but enough to signal that the winds are shifting, and a scarf may be wise. Hibbard loved his adopted coastal town with an unusual intensity (“Leave it alone,” he’d say to those inclined to change it). He opened an art school there, founded and acted as president of the Rockport Art Association for 16 years, and even co-designed a replica float of the town’s famed red fishing shack (known as “the most often-painted building in America”), Motif No. 1, to be driven all the way to Chicago for the 1933 World’s Fair. (It won first place, by the way.) And though Rockport was by and large a summertime destination, Hibbard was by and large an artist who loathed painting summer scenes (he found it a boring season, lacking in contrast). In that respect, Autumn in Rockport acts as a tender dedication to the ones who stayed, those year-rounders who willingly tested their mettle against the harsh New England winters, refusing to live at arm’s length. Interested in getting this work up on your wall? Inquire within.
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