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

Catalogue Entry

enlarge
Photo: Unknown
The Vacant Chair, 1865 (Hills no. 12.0.5). Lightened
Lightened
Photo: Unknown
The Vacant Chair, 1865 (Hills no. 12.0.5). Detail
Detail
Photo: Unknown
The Vacant Chair, 1865 (Hills no. 12.0.5). Detail
Detail
Photo: Unknown
The Vacant Chair, 1865 (Hills no. 12.0.5). Verso
Verso
Photo: Unknown
The Vacant Chair, 1865 (Hills no. 12.0.5). Verso inscription
Verso inscription
Photo: Unknown
The Vacant Chair, 1865 (Hills no. 12.0.5). Black & white
Black & white
Photo: Courtesy of Sotheby’s, Inc. © 2020
[ 12.0 Interiors—No or Slight Figures ]info
⊠
12.0 Interiors—No or Slight Figures

Johnson often painted interiors without people, no doubt studies from real life. He used such oil studies to provide context for genre scenes. Objects resting on mantles, such as ceramic parrots or earthenware jars, frequently reappear, rearranged in interior genre scenes. —PH

View all works in this theme »

Hills no. 12.0.5
1907 Sale no. 97
The Vacant Chair
Alternate titles: Kitchen at Mount Vernon [incorrect]; Kitchen Interior
1865
Oil on board
14 x 19 in. (35.6 x 48.3 cm)
Signed and dated lower right: E Johnson - 65
Bruce and Susan Lueck, Camden, South Carolina
Description / Remarks

Hills, 2022: Although John I. H. Baur owned and annotated a copy of the catalogue of Johnson's 1907 Estate Sale, he did not include this work in his own 1940 catalogue listing; he must have obtained it after publication.

Hills opinion letter, 2014: "This oil painting shows a rustic interior with a large fireplace and a number of objects on the mantel. To the left is a wooden armchair with a colorful cushion set behind a footstool with an embroidered cushion. To the right of the fireplace a brick wall indicates an oven. In the niche that holds the door is a pot and a brass candlestick. There are no figures in the scene."

MacGibeny, 2021: As described in the article "Eastman Johnson's Lunchtime" by David L. Simon, 2003, "The Vacant Chair" was a popular Civil War song written by George Frederick Root in 1861, invoking a tradition of empty chairs as memorials and more specifically referring to the absence of a soldier lost to war.The lyrics begin:

We shall meet, but we shall miss him
There will be one vacant chair;
We shall linger to caress him
While we breathe our evening prayer.
When a year ago we gathered,
Joy was in his mild blue eye,
But a golden cord is severed,
And our hopes in ruin lie.

The Library of Congress identifies the song as being associated with the Union side. See the linked sheet music by Root from the Library of Congress Civil War Sheet Music Collection. 

This painting also represents the setting for the Johnson paintings Grandpa's Pastime, Winding Yarn, Maine Interior—Man with Pipe, and Maine Interior—Man Smoking Pipe.

1907 Estate Sale info
No. 97: "An old arm-chair with a patchwork seat, and a foot stool with an embroidered and fringed cushion, stand near a small rough brick fireplace, with glowing coals on the hearth. On the rude shelf of the fireplace are various dishes, a bayonet hangs on the chimney above, and on the right is a brick bread oven in the door of which stands a brass candlestick and a tin pail."
"Signed at the lower right, E. Johnson.
Height, 14 inches; length, 19 inches."
[Annotation: “45.00”]
Additional Material
Markings
Verso of board, upper left: "The Vacant Chair" / No. 7 -; upper right: 14 x 19; lower right: 1-1/2 - 4460 - R.M.C.; center, upside-down: Wintersteen
Labels
Label on verso of stretcher, upper left: 4365/X21
Provenance
Eastman Johnson estate/Mrs. Eastman Johnson, New York, 1906 (by bequest)
[The artist's estate sale, American Art Association, New York, February 26–27, 1907, no. 97 (as The Vacant Chair)]
Fiorello Galleries, Philadelphia
[Sotheby's, April 25, 1980, Sale 4365, American 19th and 20th Century Paintings, Drawings, Watercolors & Sculpture, Sale 4365, lot 21 (as Kitchen at Mount Vernon)]
[Everard & Company Antique Auctions, Savannah, Georgia, February 27, 2014, lot 3297043]
Private estate, Atlanta, by 2013
Private collection, by March 2014 (by purchase)
Avery Galleries, Bryn Mawr, Pennsylvania, until November 2014
Bruce and Susan Lueck, Camden, South Carolina, November 2014 (by purchase)
Exhibitions
1907a Century Association
Century Association, New York, Memorial Exhibition of Eastman Johnson, February 9–13, 1907, as The Vacant Chair.
1939 Macbeth Gallery
Macbeth Gallery, New York, Americana, November 1–30, 1939. (Macbeth Gallery 1939); (Macbeth Gallery 1976), no. 17, as Kitchen Interior.
References
AAA 1907b
Catalogue of Finished Pictures, Studies, and Drawings by the Late Eastman Johnson, N.A. New York: American Art Association, February 1907. Sale catalogue, n.p., no. 97, as The Vacant Chair.
Hills Examination / Opinion
Examination date(s): 2014-04-18 (at Adelson Galleries)
Hills opinion letter: April 21, 2014 view »
Keywords
Record last updated July 22, 2022. Please note that the information on this and all pages is periodically reviewed and subject to change.
Citation: Hills, Patricia, and Abigael MacGibeny. "The Vacant Chair, 1865 (Hills no. 12.0.5)." Eastman Johnson Catalogue Raisonné. www.eastmanjohnson.org/catalogue/entry.php?id=155 (accessed on April 26, 2024).