Gari Melchers: Belmont

'The Sun Porch' by Melchers seen in the
living room at Belmont

"Despite the cultural, social, and commercial opportunities New York offered, the city was not acceptable to Melchers as a year-round place of residence. He needed a home and a studio in an undeveloped area to be close to the rural subject matter that he had always favored. Melchers was, no doubt, already looking for a country estate in 1916 when a Detroit architect, Frank Baldwin, suggested that he consider Belmont. The artist must have been impressed by the picturesque site of this eighteenth-century Georgian home perched on a ridge overlooking the falls of the Rappahannock Rive in Falmouth, Virginia. Good rail service to New York satisfied an important practical consideration. Consequently, he purchased Belmont, acquiring the deed to the house and property in September 1916.

Melchers was not the first owner to enlarge the house at Belmont, but his alteration was unique, for it expressed in architectural terms his longstanding fascination with light. He added the five-sided sun porch that now graces the southern side of the house. This luminous alcove boasts six expansive arched windows and a set of glass doors that open onto a broad lawn. This delightful effect of the small room was captured by him in his painting 'Sun Porch.'

Light is also a salient feature of the fieldstone studio that Melchers had constructed on the grounds in 1923-24. Northern exposure is provided by a huge window in the gable wall of the work area. A skylight illuminates an adjacent room that the artist used for exhibition purposes.

Corrine and Gari enriched the interior of the house with the eclectic array of paintings, furnishing, and decorative artworks that they had collected. They had acquired works of art by Frans Snyders, Auguste Rodin, Gainsborough Dupont, Pierre Puvis de Chavannes, Childe Hassam, George Hitchcock, Hans Hermann, Walter MacEwen, and others. These are still displayed in the house. The crowning gem of the collection is Berthe Morisot's fresh and vividly colored 'A Sailing Party,' although the collection at one time boasted a Degas which Mrs. Melchers purchased at a sale in New York in 1921. Her collection of Wedgwood, Delft, and Canton ware and many other decorative art objects remain at Belmont today, including a sumptuous French Savonnerie carpet that beautifies the drawing room."

To be continued

(Excerpts from "Gari Melchers: His Life and Art" by Joseph G. Dreiss.)