Maurice Brazil Prendergast was one of the earliest American Post-Impressionist painters, with a style characterized by distinct, swirling brush marks and vivid colors. While he was member of The Eight, from the famed 1908 show at Macbeth Gallery, his style and subject varied greatly from the urban realism of his peers.
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Prendergast was born in Newfoundland but moved with his family to Boston in 1868 after the failure of their father’s trading post. He began his artistic career as a commercial art apprentice, painting sign cards for department store windows. Prendergast and his brother Charles, also an artist, were very close and spent most of their lives together. The pair traveled to England in the 1880s and to Paris in 1891 to study at the Atelier Colorossi and the Académie Julian. In Europe, they were introduced to two leading British avant-garde painters, Walter Richard Sickert and Aubrey Beardsley, and to the Post-Impressionist paintings of such artists as Edouard Vuillard and Pierre Bonnard. Prendergast and his brother returned to Boston in 1894, the same year Maurice exhibited at the Boston Arts Club, the first recorded instance of his works appearing in a show. Charles became a highly-popular frame maker, specializing in custom, hand-carved designs, while a sponsorship by the noted art collector Sarah Choate Sears took Maurice Prendergast to Italy from 1898–1899 The watercolors he produced during this trip appeared in a 1900 exhibition at Macbeth Gallery and at the Art Institute of Chicago.
In 1904, Prendergast exhibited at the National Arts Club, meeting William Glackens, Robert Henri, and John French Sloan. He joined this new circle of friends and additional artists George Luks, Everett Shinn, and Arthur B. Davies in the 1908 Macbeth Gallery Exhibition of The Eight. Continuing with The Eight, Prendergast was part of the selection committee for the 1913 Armory Show and exhibited seven of his paintings in the exhibition. He and his brother Charles moved to New York City in 1914, where he stayed until his death in 1924.
Prendergast is known for his oil and watercolor paintings of leisure scenes, primarily depicting figures in parks and along various shorelines. This painting is a fine example of his style, with rounded brush marks and a vivid — though in this case somewhat subdued — color scheme. Sunday in the Park entered the collection of his brother Charles in 1924 and it remained in the family until 1950, when it was acquired by a private collector.