Washington Square

Augusta Payne Rathbone

This colorful, Modernist color aquatint and etching is of Washington Square in Greenwich Village in New York. Rather than focus her attention on the iconic Washington Square Arch Rathbone instead chose to depict the colorful row houses on Waverly Place, across from the park.

The park is the center of activity for the Greenwich Village area, bustling with tourists, chess players, artists, students, children and residents enjoying the weather throughout the year.

Rathbone depicts a mother and baby carriage in the park in fall. A twisted, skeletal tree stretches into a clouded sky. The mostly red, brick buildings from the houses add a brightness to an otherwise drab day.

The 1833 row of red brick townhouses on the north end of Washington Square Park, known as “Waverly Place,” belongs to the later phase of the Federal style, spanning the late-18th to early-19th century in the newly independent former American colonies.