Liliane Kaufmann Fly Fishing at Fallingwater
Look closely at this fanciful interpretation of Fallingwater by the magical realist painter Peter Blume and you'll see Liliane Kaufmann fly fishing for trout in Bear Run.
This painting was comissioned of the artist Peter Blume (1906-1992) by the Kaufmanns, but once the sketches for it were done, the Kaufmanns didn't pursue its completion. Edgar Kaufmann Sr.'s mother, Betty Wolf Kaufmann, is standing next to him on the terrace; some of the Kaufmanns' long-haired dachshunds are on the boulders. If you look carefully into the window on the left of the house (which is not an accurate representation!), you can see an image of Fallingwater. Below are comments by Edgar Kaufmann jr. on the painting.
"There
was an American painter named - there is, still - Peter Blume, who was
a really fascinating painter, very interesting. He and his wife and their
dog came here. And the dog jumped over the parapet on the bridge side
of the living room, and was very surprised! He survived, he was just a
puppy. But what happened was, my father wanted a portrait of his mother.
And he had gotten very fascinated by Grant Wood, and I thought that maybe
Grant Wood could be bettered. So I said, "you know, you ought to
look at this guy Peter Blume, he's really quite a good painter."
And he had a very fascinating painting on exhibition in New York right
then. So I got father to come down and look at this. He was much more
realistic than Grant Wood, and had much more power as well. And so he
was sold right away, and Peter Blume was interested, so he came out here,
interviewed my grandmother, did a few sketches, and came and stayed with
us, did a few more sketches. And finally one day he said, "You know,
I think that rather than paint a portrait of one person, I would like
to paint a picture of the house with all the family around it. Grandma
on one terrace, junior down in the cellar. And so he made some sketches.
And they were supposed to go on that wall next to the dining table where
we talked about the shelves. And we took one look at the model and we
all just said no.....You know, you were in the house, and you were looking
at a picture of the house, and if you looked through the picture of the
house, on the back wall you could see the picture of the house! So, that
never happened."
The painting is oil on canvas and measures 10" x 14". Pensler Galleries in Washington, D.C., is currently offering it for sale if you are interested in acquiring it.
This is the first day of trout season. Native brook trout in a stream are indicators of its exceptional quality, just as a canary will only survive in the cleanest air in a coal mine. The gaudy brook trout still exists in Bear Run at Fallingwater, although fishing for them is now restricted.
The brook trout, our only native stream-dwelling trout, is also Pennsylvania's state fish. All of Pennsylvania's natural state symbols are found at Fallingwater and WPC's adjacent Bear Run Nature Reserve.
Discover more about Fallingwater
Discover more about the Kaufmann Family