Briefly: The American Collection

Joslyn's American collection includes Colonial-era portraits by James Peale and Mather Brown; Hudson River School landscapes by Thomas Cole and Homer Dodge Martin; and important post-Civil War paintings by Eastman Johnson, Winslow Homer, Thomas Eakins and William Merritt Chase, Mary Cassatt and Childe Hassam. Notable examples of early American furniture, as well as sculpture and decorative arts from the eighteenth through twentieth centuries complement our installations.

Below are highlights selected from Joslyn's American collection.
American
Artist Unknown (American, 19th Century),
The Greenhow Children , ca. 1818,
oil on canvas, 60 1/2 x 73 3/4 in.
Gift of Miss Emily Keller, 1942.112

The Greenhow Children represents a marked departure from earlier American portraiture, seen in the comfortable setting and informal poses of the subjects.

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George Ault (American, 1891-1948),
August Night At Russell's Corners
, 1940,

oil on canvas, 18 x 24 in.; 45.72 x 60.96 cm
Museum purchase, 1955.189

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George Bellows (American, 1882-1925),
Jewel Coast, California , 1917,
oil on wood, 20 x 24 in.; 50.8 x 60.96 cm
Museum purchase, 1959.164

In Jewel Coast the brilliant blues and greens of the sky and swirling water accentuate the sculptural presence of the massive yellow rock that dominates the foreground. The result is a muscular, impressionistic, view of the landscape, well suited to Bellow's talents.

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Thomas Hart Benton (American, 1889–1975),
The Hailstorm , 1940,
tempera on canvas mounted on panel, 33 x 40, 83.82 x 101.6 cm
Gift of the James A. Douglas Memorial Foundation (1971), 1952.11

An artist fully in touch with contemporary art and aesthetic theory, Benton’s anti-intellectual, nationalistic bravado held special appeal in Depression-era America. The Hailstorm, with its rural theme, vibrant colors, tilted perspective, lanky figures, and undulating landscape, is quintessential Benton; with its hallmark mule and rolling countryside, it represents archetypal Missouri.

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Albert Bierstadt (American, born Germany, 1830–1902),
Storm on the Matterhorn , 1886,
oil on canvas, 53¾ x 82½, 136.5 x 212.1 cm
Gift of Mrs. Ben Gallagher, 1966.620

Bierstadt accompanied several government-sponsored expeditions to the American West, and his resulting panoramas strongly influenced the post-Civil War generation’s perception of the region. Based on sketches he made during one of his trips abroad, Storm on the Matterhorn amply demonstrates the artist’s love of the sublime as well as the technical skill and imaginative power that so greatly appealed to the viewers of his day.

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Thomas Birch (American, 1779–1851),
St. Eustatia , n.d.,
oil on canvas, 20 x 30 in.; 50.8 x 76.2 cm
Museum purchase, 1964.618

The painting St. Eustatia is of an island near Puerto Rico in the Netherlands Leeward Islands in the Lesser Antilles. During the Napoleonic Wars, these were British territories, but they were returned to the Dutch in 1816 after the wars. Birch may have relied on prints for his conception of the scene.

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George Caleb Bingham (American, 1811–1879),
Watching the Cargo by Night , 1854,
oil on canvas, 24 x 29 in.; 60.96 x 73.66 cm
Gift of Foxley & Co, 1997.33

Bingham, a largely self-taught artist, lived most of his life in Missouri. His pictures almost always carry political messages. This painting is from a period in which Bingham experimented with night scenes, beautifully playing the effects of firelight and moonlight against the central figure and the night sky.

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John George Brown (American, 1831-1913),
The Card Trick , ca. 1880s,
oil on canvas, 25 x 30 in.; 76.2 x 102.24 cm
Gift of the estate of Mrs. Sarah Joslyn, 1944.14

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Mary Cassatt (American, 1844–1926),
Lydia Reading the Morning Paper (No. 1) (Woman Reading) (Femme lisant) (Portrait of Lydia Cassatt, the Artist's Sister) , 1878–79,
oil on canvas, 32 x 23 1/2 inches
Museum purchase, Joslyn Endowment Fund, 1942.38

Mary Cassatt settled permanently in Paris in 1874, where she became the most universally recognized female painter associated with Impressionism.  Cassatt took an active interest in and explored their new approaches to color theory, brushwork, and figure-ground relationships.

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William Merritt Chase (American, 1849-1916),
Sunlight and Shadow , 1884,
oil on canvas, 65¼ x 77¾, 165.74 x 194.3 cm
Gift of the Friends of Art, 1932.4

Chase personified the late-nineteenth-century international artist. Although he early on practiced the Munich style of painting, Sunlight and Shadow marked a transition in Chase’s career. The bold brushwork and anecdotal subject are hallmarks of the Munich School, but the plein-air colors, subtle light contrasts, and flat shapes are indebted to Impressionism.

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John Steuart Curry (American, 1879-1946),
Manhunt , 1931,
oil on canvas, 30 x 40 1/4 in.; 76.2 x 102.24 cm
Museum purchase, 1979.142

Curry, best known for his dramatic paintings of Kansas and Wisconsin farm life, belongs to the tradition of American Scene painters. These artists felt American artists should depict American subject matter. Manhunt, painted early in Curry's career, portrays a form of lynching prevalent in the South after Reconstruction.

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Manierre Dawson (American, 1887-1969),
Equation , 1914,
oil on cardboard, 36 x 27 5/8 in.; 91.44 x 70.17 cm
Museum purchase with funds provided by the Joslyn Women's Association and gift of Ephraim Marks, 1988.4

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Thomas Eakins (American, 1844-1916),
Professor John Laurie Wallace , 1885,
oil on canvas, 50¼ x 32½ , 127.64 x 82.5 cm
Gift of the James A. Douglas Memorial Foundation (1971), 1941.24

Today regarded as one of America’s greatest painters, in his time Eakins was frequently at the center of artistic controversy. His work was consistently deplored for its excessive realism. Favoring the strong light-and-dark contrasts perfected by seventeenth-century Spanish masters, Eakins set his subjects in dim interiors, employing dark pigments and rapid, sweeping brushstrokes to capture their mood.

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Frederick Childe Hassam (American, 1859–1935),
April Showers, Champs Elysees, Paris , 1888,
oil on canvas, 12½ x 16¾, 31.75 x 42.55 cm
Museum purchase, 1946.30

The civic renaissance initiated in the 1870s turned the city’s outdoor cafés and avenues into fashionable meeting places for Paris’ bourgeoisie, and Hassam’s April Showers illustrates the phenomenon: a well-dressed woman observes the bustle of pedestrians and carriages on Paris’ most famous boulevard. The unrestrained patches of muted color faithfully capture the effects of a gray, rainy day in the city, a favored theme of Hassam’s throughout his life.

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Robert Henri (American, 1865-1929),
Portrait of Fi , 1907,
oil on canvas, 24 1/4 x 20 1/8 in.; 61.6 x 51.12 cm
Museum purchase, Irving W. Benolken Memorial Fund, 1957.14

Champion of the masses and struggling artists, Henri, “the great white knight of American art,” forged a group of painters into The Eight, influential pioneers of realism who clamored for reform not only in art but in the entire structure of the antiquated American academy system. In his own art Henri particularly enjoyed painting children, their range and character taken from the breadth of his travels. Rapidly executed and capturing the spontaneity of youth, these small portraits account for a large part of his oeuvre.

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Winslow Homer (American, 1836–1910),
Trooper Meditating Beside a Grave , ca. 1865,
oil on canvas, 16 x 8 inches, 40.64 x 20.32 cm
Gift of Dr. Harold Gifford and Ann Gifford Forbes, 1960.298

Homer worked as an illustrator, providing visual reportage of the Civil War to American magazines. Unlike others who translated their sketches of the war into large-scale, epic paintings, Homer opted to portray the more personal consequences of battle. Here, a Union soldier contemplates the grave of a fallen comrade, the memorials of others scattered in the background.

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Daniel Huntington (American, 1816-1906),
Roman Ruins in Southern Italy , 1848,
oil on canvas, 43 ½ x 63 ¼ in.; 110.5 x 160.66 cm
Gift of J.L. Brandeis and Sons Co., 1952.97

Huntington mostly concentrated on portraiture, historical scenes, and allegories rather than landscape, making Joslyn’s landscape somewhat of an exception. The work was most likely begun during the artist’s stay in Rome between 1842 and 1845, where numerous artists gathered to study works of classical antiquity and practice their draftsmanship.

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Henry Inman (American, 1801-1846),
Onpatonga (Big Elk) , ca. 1832-33,
oil on canvas, 30 x 25 in.
Museum purchase from the Edward R. Trabold and Lulu H. Trabold Fund with additional funds from the Durham Center for Western Studies Art Endowment Fund, 2011.12

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Henry Inman (American, 1801–1846),
Portrait of William Drummond Stewart , 1844,
oil on canvas, 30 x 25 inches, 76.2 x 63.5 cm
Museum purchase, 1963.617

Henry Inman, an accomplished American portraitist, was engaged by Stewart to paint this likeness, considered by many to be one of Inman’s finest. The ruddy complexion suggests Stewart’s love of outdoor life, while his erect posture, Roman nose, and the rich fur collar imply his aristocracy and wealth

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Eastman Johnson (American, 1824–1906),
Child with a Rabbit , 1879,
oil on panel, 14 x 11 ¾ in.; 35.56 x 29.85 cm
Museum Purchase, 1946.32

Eastman Johnson specialized in intimate scenes of everyday life, paintings that, as the horrors of the Civil War dominated the national agenda, satisfied America’s nostalgia for a simpler time. In the 1870s Johnson painted several portraits of his daughter, Ethel, with her favorite pet. These paintings are considered some of the most sophisticated Johnson produced.

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Charles Bird King (American, 1785–1862),
Portrait of Shaumonekusse (L’Ietan), an Oto Half-Chief , n.d.,
oil on canvas, 29½ x 24½ inches, 74.93 x 62.23 cm
Gift of M. Knoedler & Co., New York, 1978.267

An accomplished professional portraitist, King is best known today for his depictions of Native American dignitaries who came to Washington to confer with government officials. Shaumonekusse was a member of a distinguished delegation of Kansas, Missouri, Omaha, Oto, and Pawnee men who traveled to Washington in 1821.

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Walt Kuhn (American, 1877-1949),
Woman With a Black Necklace , 1928,
oil on canvas, 30 x 25 in.; 76.2 x 63.5 cm.
Gift of Mr. Charles Simon, 1979.139

In Woman with Black Necklace, the brilliant reds, greens, and blacks of her form against the deep blue background have a surprising weight and solidity, despite the lack of modeling. Even the black beads of her necklace look more like dense lumps of coal than bits of costume jewelry. Appropriately, Kuhn gives his portrait of this strangely gaudy woman, who is probably a gypsy, a magnetic, powerful physical presence.

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Paul Manship (American, 1885–1966),
Indian Hunter and Pronghorn Antelope , 1917,
plaster painted in bronze, Indian: 57½ high,127 cm; antelope: 62 high, 157.48 cm
Gift of the artist, 1956.391.1-2

One of the outstanding American sculptors of the early 20th century, Manship’s work bridged the traditional and the modern. Its characteristic polish and streamlined stylization is often associated with the development of Art Deco, a dominant style in 1920s American architecture and design. In Indian Hunter and Pronghorn Antelope, embodying the full flavor of Manship’s refined works, the sleek, silhouetted pair emphasizes the power and grace of flowing line.

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Wright Morris (American, 1910-1998),
Gano Grain Elevator, Western Kansas , 1940,
gelatin silver print, 9 1/2 x 7 1/2 in.; 24.13 x 19.03 cm
Museum purchase, 1997.4.1

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Dale Nichols (American, 1904-1995),
Road to Adventure , 1940,
oil on canvas, 30 x 40 in.; 76.2 x 101.6
Museum purchase, 1942.80

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James Peale (American, 1749–1831),
Portrait of Katherine Francis , 1807,
oil on canvas, 31 x 25 ½ in.; 78.74 x 64.77 cm
Museum Purchase, 1982.2

This depiction of Katherine Francis evidences James’ early work as a miniaturist: the delicate lace bodice is rendered with breathtaking delicacy and detail. The high coloring, backlighting, and attention to particulars are all features of Neoclassicism, then the dominant European artistic trend.

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Severin Roesen (American, born Germany, ca.1815–ca.1872),
Fruit Still Life with Compote of Strawberries , n.d.,
oil on canvas, 16 x 20 in.; 40.64 x 50.8 cm;
Museum purchase with funds from the Gilbert M. and Martha H. Hitchcock Foundation, 2002.10

Upon his arrival in New York around 1848, Roesen quickly adopted characteristically “American” style elements: classical balance, intense realism, and simplicity of form and composition. These he fused into brilliantly colored and brightly illuminated still lifes in which the painted objects appear almost aggressively physical and present.

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John Singer Sargent (American, 1856-1925),
Portrait of Mrs. A. Lawrence Rotch , 1903,
oil on canvas,
Lent anonymously, L-1987.5

John Singer Sargent was considered the leading portrait painter of his generation. After securing a commission, he would often review a client’s wardrobe to pick suitable attire.

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John Sloan (American, 1871–1951),
Sunset, West Twenty-third Street (23rd Street, Roofs, Sunset) , 1906,
oil on canvas, 24 3/8 x 36¼, 61.91 x 92.1 cm
25th Anniversary Purchase, 1957.15

Sloan considered himself a member of the urban working class and found views of life in lower Manhattan's markets or back alleys to be interesting and relevant for a mass audience. In keeping with the spirit of the times, his urban vision is characterized by frank observation, humor, and compassion. A study of an undistinguished cityscape, Sunset, West Twenty-third Street displays Sloan's ability to transform an ordinary setting into an image of beauty and tranquillity.

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Edwin Lord Weeks (American, 1849–1903),
Indian Barbers, Saharanpore , ca. 1895,
oil on canvas, 56 ¼ x 75 in.; 142.88 x 190.5 cm
Gift of the Friends of Art Collection, 1932.22

In Indian Barbers, set in a city in northwest India, the amusing scene fits the Victorian taste for incidents of everyday life. Weeks’ composition delineates the simple facts while conveying the scene’s exoticism, which is heightened by the dazzling light.

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Grant Wood (American, 1891–1942),
Stone City, Iowa , 1930,
oil on wood panel, 30¼ x 40, 76.84 x 101.6 cm
Gift of the Art Institute of Omaha, 1930.35

Of the leading American Regionalist painters of the 1930s, Wood was regarded as the quiet philosopher-artist. His reassuring, representational paintings embodied enduring American myths about the perfection of rural life. Stone City, Iowa, his first major landscape, epitomizes Wood's commentary about change that was often threaded through his traditional subjects. A boomtown gone bust, Stone City seems to have gone back to a purer purpose of grazing animals and growing crops.

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