loading loading
Eastman Johnson Catalogue Raisonné
Patricia Hills, PhD, Founder and Director | Abigael MacGibeny, MA, Project Manager

Catalogue Entry

enlarge
Photo: Courtesy National Park Service, Longfellow House - Washington's Headquarters National Historic Site
43.1 U.S. Early Portrait Drawings, Men

The earliest recorded portrait drawing of a known individual by Johnson is Henry Sewell, done in Augusta, Maine, and dated November 26, 1844. Already in 1844, when Johnson was twenty, this work shows the artist's superb use of charcoal (black chalk) to highlight the lights and shadow that capture the three-dimensionality of his sitter. This talent may have been initiated from the time he worked in a lithography shop in Boston, and also the availability of mezzotints. 

The Sewell portrait also shows Johnson’s understanding of anatomy in the sitter’s facial structure. During this period, 1844–1949, Johnson almost always used charcoal (black chalk) for his portraits. Some are half-length portraits including hands, but the majority are heads (and necks) alone. He took about three days to complete a charcoal portrait. The style of the time was to present portraits in oval frames. 

See Technical Information on Johnson's Practices for a discussion of charcoal, black chalk, crayon, and pastel. —PH

View all works in this theme »

Hills no. 43.1.10
Baur no. 333
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
National Park Service, Longfellow House - Washington's Headquarters National Historic Site title: Henry W. Longfellow
1846, September 19–October 6
Charcoal and white chalk on tan wove paper
21 x 19 in. (53.3 x 48.3 cm) (oval)
Neither signed nor dated
Description / Remarks

MacGibeny, 2022: Henry Wadsworth Longfellow commissioned Johnson to draw portraits of himself, his family, and his friends after being impressed by Johnson's portraits of his parents, Stephen and Zilpah Longfellow. In his journal entry of January 16, 1846, he wrote, "Went to Portland where I found all pretty well. A young artist of Maine, Mr. Johnson, has taken my father and mother, in every way is excellently made.” On October 22 he wrote, "Johnson’s sketch [sic] of [Longfellow's sisters] Anne and Mary are quite charming. I am delighted with them. He is to take for me all the club. The mutual Admiration Society which I shall hang in the Hall to show people what a fine set of heads they are." Johnson was only twenty-two years old when he made this drawing. These Longfellow commissions in the late 1840s helped to build Johnson's reputation as a young artist in America before he went to Europe in 1849 to learn to paint.

Longfellow's journal entries chronicle the making of the drawing. September 19, 1846: "In town. Young Eastman Johnson began a crayon sketch of my head. From the first sitting I augur well of it." October 1, 1846: "Gave Mr. Yale an hour for my miniature, then went to town and gave Johnson a sitting." October 6, 1846: "We drove to town with the Portland visitors. Went to Johnson’s rooms. All delighted with his portrait, thinking it the best ever made of me.”

Longfellow House catalogue record, July 9, 2014: "Oval portrait, bust-length, facing front. Black hair, eyes, coat, neck scarf, jabot, and coat; white collar."

Provenance
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, Cambridge, Massachusetts, c. 1846 (by commission)
Children of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow: Charles Appleton Longfellow, Ernest Wadsworth Longfellow, Alice Mary Longfellow, Edith Longfellow, and Anne Allegra Longfellow, 1882 (by bequest)
Longfellow House Trust, 1913–1974
National Park Service, Longfellow House - Washington's Headquarters National Historic Site, Cambridge, Massachusetts, 1974 (by transfer)
Exhibitions
1999 Brooklyn Museum
Brooklyn Museum of Art, Brooklyn, New York, Eastman Johnson: Painting America, October 29, 1999–February 6, 2000. (Exhibition catalogue: Carbone and Hills 1999), no. 3, color illus., p. 14, as Henry Wadsworth Longfellow. Traveled to: San Diego Museum of Fine Arts, San Diego, February 25–May 21, 2000; Seattle Art Museum, Seattle, June 8–September 10, 2000.
References
Hale 1898a
Hale, Edward Everett. "James Russell Lowell and His Friends." The Outlook 58, no. 1 (January 1, 1898), p. 26, illus. captioned "From the portrait by Eastman Johnson at Craigie House, Cambridge, Mass."
Walton 1906
Walton, William. "Eastman Johnson, Painter." Scribner's Magazine 40 (September 1906), p. 264.
Hartmann 1908
Hartmann, Sadakichi. "Eastman Johnson: American Genre Painter." The International Studio 34 (April 1908), p. 108.
Ticknor 1922
Ticknor, Caroline. Glimpses of Authors. London: T. Werner Laurie, Ltd., 1922, facing p. 44, illus.
Bolton 1923
Bolton, Theodore. Early American Portrait Draughtsmen in Crayon. New York: F. F. Sherman, 1923, p. 40, no. 22, as Henry Wadsworth Longfellow.
Baur 1940
Baur, John I. H. An American Genre Painter: Eastman Johnson, 1824–1906. Brooklyn, NY: Brooklyn Museum, Brooklyn Institute of Arts and Sciences, 1940. Exhibition catalogue (1939 Brooklyn Museum), p. 75, no. 333, as Henry Wadsworth Longfellow.
Hills 1977
Hills, Patricia. The Genre Paintings of Eastman Johnson: The Sources and Development of His Style and Themes. New York: Garland Publishing, 1977, p. 193, fig. 6, as Henry Wadsworth Longfellow.
Carbone and Hills 1999
Carbone, Teresa A., and Patricia Hills. Eastman Johnson: Painting America. Brooklyn, NY: Brooklyn Museum of Art, in association with Rizzoli International Publications, 1999. Exhibition catalogue (1999 Brooklyn Museum), pp. 13, 14, 122, no. 3, illus., as Henry Wadsworth Longfellow.
Longfellow c. 1846–48
Longfellow, Henry Wadsworth. Manuscript journal. Reproduced in Samuel Longfellow, Life of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, with Extracts from His Journals and Correspondence (Boston: Ticknor and Company, 1886); and housed in the Henry Wadsworth Longfellow papers, MS Am 1340, (200), Volume: 198. Houghton Library, September 19, 1846; October 1, 1846; October 6, 1846.
Hills Examination / Opinion
Examination date(s): Early 1970s
Examination notes: Chalk and black crayon with white crayon on forehead, eyes, white collar. Fine network of lines to create a soft grey. More homogeneous in the darker areas.
Sitter Biography
Sitter: Longfellow, Henry Wadsworth
Biography:

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807–1882). Boston poet and early patron of Johnson. Husband of Frances Elizabeth Appleton Longfellow; father of Charles Appleton, Ernest, Fanny, Alice Mary, Edith, and Anne Allegra. 

Longfellow's circle
Keywords
enlarge
Photo: Bowdoin College Library
Henry W. Longfellow [engraving by Henry Wright Smith]
c.1846
Engraving on paper
10 1/4 x 7 1/16 in. (26 x 18 cm)
Printed center left: Johnson Del.; printed center right: H. W. Smith Sc.; inscribed bottom center: Henry W. Longfellow
Bowdoin College Library

See all Prints after Works by Johnson.

Record last updated March 30, 2022. Please note that the information on this and all pages is periodically reviewed and subject to change.
Citation: Hills, Patricia, and Abigael MacGibeny. "Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, 1846, September 19–October 6 (Hills no. 43.1.10)." Eastman Johnson Catalogue Raisonné. www.eastmanjohnson.org/catalogue/entry.php?id=1011 (accessed on March 29, 2024).