John Henry Twachtman usually paints scenes of nature veiled in cool, shimmering light—e.g., The White Bridge (c. 1895; Martin B. Koon Memorial Collection, Minneapolis Institute of the Arts, Minnesota); September Sunshine (c. 1895; The Margaret and Raymond Horowitz Collection, National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.).

Twachtman, forty-two in 1895, had gone to Munich, Germany, twenty years earlier to study painting and had adopted the broad brushwork and warm, dark coloring of the Munich school.

He studied in 1883 at the Académie Julian in Paris, where he came into contact with Impressionism and began to paint with broken dabs of color.

Like many artists at the time, Twachtman was exposed to Japanism, the contemporary art world's interest in Japanese aesthetics (he collects Japanese prints).

At first unsuccessful as a professional painter, he supported himself after 1889 by teaching at the Art Students League in New York City.

During that year he mastered his lyrical interpretation of landscape.

The Ten, a group of ten American painters, first exhibit together in 1898, in New York City.

The members are Childe Hassam, John Henry Twachtman, J. Alden Weir, Thomas W. Dewing, Joseph DeCamp, Frank W. Benson, Willard Leroy Metcalf, Edmund Charles Tarbell, Robert Reid, and E.E. Simmons.

Most members of the group paint in an Impressionist style.

Although their work does not differ radically in technique or subject matter from that of the artists who participate in the large annual exhibitions of the Society of American Artists and the National Academy of Design, they choose to exhibit independently, hoping to draw public attention to their paintings.

All are former members of the Society of American Artists.

Winslow Homer had declined an invitation to join the group; Abbott Handerson Thayer had accepted membership but withdrew before the group's first exhibition.