Two Worlds Colliding
American painter Andrew Wyeth’s painting ‘Christina’s World’ (1948), has fascinated me all my life. I can’t tell you why exactly, perhaps it was just the colours. I felt like I’d known them all my life and maybe I had. I don’t believe I ever consciously set out to capture a like-hearted moment in my life-time and for one reason mainly, I never had a human subject. Yet the other (the house) I sort of did.
House on Poukawa
Mine I called ‘House on Poukawa‘, it was old and surrounded at the time by golden strands of long grass. It was one of those fortunate shots because my sister’s partner has tried to get his own shot away of the house over the years and never (in his words) been able to get anything like the one I got on the day. The light, the grass was all wonderful, like I say, it was a fortunate shot.
I had the Wyeth print on my wall from age 14 and 35 years later it still has that same timeless effect on me. It enchants me. The house in the painting is the Olson Home and was built in the 1700s by the Hathornes, a seafaring family. In 1871, Captain Samuel Hathorne IV replaced the old hip roof with a pitched roof and added several bedrooms on the third floor.
Half century later, his descendants, the Olsons, invited the young Andrew Wyeth to use one of the upstairs rooms as a part-time studio. He used his upstairs studio for 30 years and featured the house in many paintings and lithographs. He captured stark rooms, austere mantels, and somber rooftop views. Wyeth said, “In the portraits of that house, the windows are eyes or pieces of the soul, almost. To me, each window is a different part of Christina’s life.”
Christina Olson
“Christina Olson was a real person. She was born May 3, 1893 and died January 27, 1968. Except for the last two months of her life, she lived her entire life in the house on the hill in the painting. She lived there with her parents until they died and then lived there with her younger brother Al until they both had to finally leave the family home in November 1967 because of health reasons. The house is located on a hill at Hathorn Point on the coast of Maine at Cushing. Nowadays, the house is preserved as a tourist attraction.
At age 3, Christina was walking with an odd gait and had difficulty with balance. Her mother wondered if there had been some unknown injury, illness, or undetected birth defect. She encouraged Christina to practice walking straight on the seams of the linoleum on the floor. A few years later, her father took her on a six-hour buggy ride to see a doctor in Rockland, Maine.
She progressed through school and was able to walk the mile and a half to school despite her stumbling gait. The school only had eight grades. Christina was persuaded to attend an additional year because her teacher noted that she was intelligent and curious. The teacher hoped that Christina might become a teacher herself. Because of her mother’s failing health, Christina took over managing the sixteen room family home at age thirteen. She excelled in homemaking skills and was an excellent seamstress. She also was the master of many nautical skills. Still, at age thirteen, her unnatural, stumbling gait was very evident.
The happiest years of her life appeared to be between the ages of 19 and 24. Many families spent summers in the area and in 1912 Christina met and fell in love with a young man who attended Harvard. They exchanged many letters during the winters and spent time together during the summers. In 1917, this young man stopped writing. He had met another young woman and married. In one of his letters to Christina, he had written “She can row a boat, climb a tree, harness a horse, and drive a carriage. She outshines me in everything here at Cushing.” The young man was a scholar and Christina had been able to communicate with him at an intellectual level.
A Disability
Christina’s disability progressed as she got older. In her 20’s, she had begun to fall often. Her mother made her knee pads to wear under her long dresses. She would not tolerate anyone referring to her as crippled. In 1918, aged 25 she enjoyed a trip to Boston. At age 26, she couldn’t walk more than three steps without grabbing an object, her hands were weakening and she was experiencing exhaustion after ordinary tasks.
After avoiding doctors all her life, she consented to a medical evaluation and was admitted to Boston City Hospital in March 1919 for an evaluation. The doctors weren’t able to diagnose her condition. Some form of “electrical” treatment was considered, but not done. She was advised to spend as much time outdoors as possible. Christina was relieved, since she had finally done what her parents had wanted for years. Doctors had examined her.
Christina continued to be a master at dressmaking and a wonderful aunt to her brothers’ children. By 1946, aged 53, she was no longer able to stand, had stopped trying to walk, and resorted to crawling. She resisted the use of a wheelchair despite the fact that her own father had begun using a wheelchair as early as 1922. She had a friend who lived in a house eight hundred feet away. She would crawl this distance in less than an hour, but arrive quite fatigued.
Betsy James, who grew up as a friend of the Olson family, married Andrew Wyeth. Wyeth became a familiar person around the Olson farm and many of his paintings involve Olson farm sites. In 1948 Wyeth sketched Christina as she crawled down the hill to visit her parent’s graves. The dress she wears in the painting is one she made and wore a few years earlier at her nephew’s wedding. Christina was amused by the fame of the painting. After Christina’s death, Betsy Wyeth stated, “She was a great friend who never asked for or expected anything and gave unconditionally.”
Christina Olson’s disability is unknown. Staff at the museum in Farnsworth, Maine simply state that Christina’s disability is unknown, but that she probably had some type of degenerative disorder. Apparently she did not have polio, but this is not known for certain. There is no history of a febrile illness resulting in muscle weakness. Currently at the Farnsworth Museum, there is an exhibit of photographs pertaining to the Olson House. Commentary about the photographs includes the following:
Christina’s World
“Christina’s World is the most famous work by American painter Andrew Wyeth, and one of the best-known American paintings of the 20th century. Painted in 1948, this tempera work is displayed at the Museum of Modern Art in New York. It depicts Christina Olson, who had an undiagnosed muscular deterioration that paralysed her lower body—likely Polio. She was a strong and independent woman who did not let anything stop her from getting what and where she wanted.
There’s an implied line as she looks at her house, dreading the crawl back but eager for the warmth it holds for her. Christina, her brother and Wyeth’s neighbours are the subjects of a number of paintings by Wyeth. Surprisingly, although Christina is the artistic subject of Wyeth’s masterpiece, she was not the model. Wyeth’s wife Betsy instead posed for the painting.
In my mind, if I could call out to Christina in the painting, I imagine her turning her head and responding with a smile.” For my part, I should probably smile back our two worlds in beautiful collision reminding me that the picture by Wyeth is simply a story about a story.
