Catalogue Entry
When Johnson returned to the United States, he not only painted genre paintings but he also continued to paint portraits, which gave him a steady income. After 1880 Johnson turned to portraiture almost exclusively. During the 1880s and 1890s he painted businessmen, lawyers, university presidents, and three U.S. presidents from life. At times he also painted their wives and children.
He was also commissioned to paint posthumous portraits, often from photographs. These portraits by and large do not have the sparkle and active brushwork of those done from life. It seems that the demand for portraits of business and civic leaders (and members of exclusive men’s clubs) was so high that portrait painters would often make copies of each other’s paintings to satisfy the market for such images. In many instances, it has been difficult to render opinions for such paintings. —PH
MacGibeny, 2021: See the linked image for a likeness of Simeon Baldwin Chittenden. Although the gift of this portrait was documented in the Brooklyn Library's annual report of 1885, the painting is not found in the Library as of this writing.
Twenty-Seventh Annual Report of the Board of Directors of The Brooklyn Library, 1885: "Mr. James H. Frothingham, in behalf of about a hundred gentlemen who had contributed the necessary funds, then presented to the Library an excellent portrait of the Hon. Simeon B. Chittenden, painted by Eastman Johnson…The President accepted the portrait in behalf of the Library, and said it was a noble portrait of a noble man, one who gave wisely as well as freely, and who, by his benefactions and public spirit, had done much to make, not only the Library, but Brooklyn, what it is to-day."
Honorable Simeon Baldwin Chittenden (1814–1889). Merchant and politician; second vice-president of the New York State Chamber of Commerce, 1867–1869; U.S. Representative from New York, 1874–1881; benefactor and member of the Board of Directors of the Brooklyn Library. Buried at Green-Wood Cemetery (as was Johnson) and eulogized by Seth Low (also portrayed by Johnson).
- Portrait pose: