RSW's Diary Comments

"Winter 1945-6. An interesting window picture of part of the studio balcony glass door and little window to the right. Thick icicles outside and gray blue winter mountain beyond. Sold in April to the Grand Central Art Gallery for their Founders Show---and acquired and owned from this show by Mr. Edward Johnson, distinguished manager of the Metropolitan Opera Co. for his noted art collection."

Comments on the back of a sepia print:

"Owned by Mr. Edward Johnson, manager of Metropolitan Opera."

Editor's Notes:

There is another painting by this same name. Not uncommon for Woodward, who perhaps, at times, over used names. Still, this painting has a dairy entry where the other canvas does not. It is also written at the time Woodward was compiling his Painting Diary and so this is easier to remember. It is also worth saying that he NEVER forgot a painting bought buy someone famous and noteworthy. For more information as to why he forgot the earlier painting by the same name  visit  the  artwork page, By the Balcony Door, 1937.

Time Magazine Cover, Dec. 21, 1936

Greenfield Recorder-Gazette, Tuesday, Nov. 26, 1946

"Robert Strong Woodward, Buckland artist, has learned through the Grand Central Art Galleries of New York that one of his paintings, a studio window picture, By the Balcony Door, has been acquired by Edward Johnson, manager of the Metropolitan Opera, for his art collection."

Edward Patrick Johnson CBE (22 August 1878 - 20 April 1959) was a Canadian operatic tenor who was billed outside North America as Edoardo Di Giovanni, and became general manager of the Metropolitan Opera in New York City. ⮞

To hear Johnson sing O' Canada on You Tube:
Click Here

In this painting, as well as two others, hangs a medallion made by a famous artist, Charles Connick. Connick is well known for his work in stained glass and famously made the amazing stained glass windows of The Fourth Presbyterian Church, Chicago. The medallion also appears in The Desk Corner (1943) and The Mountain Beyond.

The Connick Medallion today

⮜ The Medallion remains in Woodward's collection to this day. We are not sure when or how he came into possession of it and unfortunately we did not think to ask Dr. Mark for more details. The medallion appears in two other paintings, The Desk Corner (1943) and the 1945 version of By the Balcony Door. We do not have an image for the 1937 version of By the Balcony Door , so we can-not date the medallion earlier than 1943.