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Photo: © Courtesy of the Huntington Art Museum, San Marino, California
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13.4 Maple Sugar Camps, 1860s—Panoramic Scenes
The making of maple sugar was a traditional industry for Maine people, as it still is today. Johnson specifically traveled to Maine, his birthplace, in the early spring of the early 1860s to study and watch farmers as they tapped the trees, gathered sap, and then set up camps to boil the sap down to thick, sweet maple syrup. As scholar Brian Allen has pointed out, during the Civil War years, maple syrup was a patriotic alternative to the sugar cane sugar of Southern plantations [See Allen 2004]. Allen quotes the Philadelphia physician and abolitionist Benjamin Rush, who said in 1792: “I cannot help contemplating a maple sugar tree without a species of veneration, for I behold in it a happy means of rendering commerce and slavery of African brethren in sugar islands as unnecessary” [See Allen 2004, p. 47].
The camps became hubs of dancing, flirting, and jocular humor, and included children mingling with adults. Although Johnson worked on making sketches for years, he never completed a finished version of the “larger & more pretenscious [sic] sugaring picture” that he wrote to patron John Coyle he had planned to make. —PH
Hills no. 13.4.7
Baur no. 50 / 1907 Sale no. 151
Sugaring Off
Alternate titles: Sugar Camp; Sugaring Off (No. 2); Sugaring-off, Number 2
c.1861–65
Locale: Near Fryeburg, Maine
Oil on canvas
34 x 54 1/4 in. (86.4 x 137.8 cm)
Initialed lower right: E. J.
Description / Remarks
Hills, 2021: The evidence for the date range of 1861–65 is a letter from Johnson to patron John Coyle dated March 13, 1864. Johnson states that he plans to do a "larger & more pretenscious" [sic] sugaring picture and is "starting for the country to make studies for a month or six weeks"; that this is his fourth annual trip to Maine to do so; and that he "hope[s] to paint it next autumn & winter."
1907 Estate Sale 
No. 151: "The artist, in executing this as well as the foregoing study for the large picture, had a house built on wheels and provided with a stove, so he was able to move his temporary studio and work in comfort, and in this way make accurate and careful studies of all details of the sugar camp. For five years in the early sixties he spent three months of each year in the maple groves at Fryeburg, Maine, and in the summer seasons of these years sought his subjects on the battlefields of the Civil War. This painting, like the foregoing one, contains the ‘Flirtation,’ the ‘Sly Drink’ and several minor incidents, some of them familiar through other studies, and others new but equally interesting."
"Signed at the lower right, E. J.
Height, 35 ½ inches; length, 57 3/8 inches."
[Annotation: “200.00 / Cogswell”]
"Signed at the lower right, E. J.
Height, 35 ½ inches; length, 57 3/8 inches."
[Annotation: “200.00 / Cogswell”]
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. 151 (as Sugaring Off)]
William Browne Cogswell, Syracuse, New York, husband of the artist's niece, Mary Naomi Johnson Cogswell (daughter of the artist's brother Reuben), February 27, 1907 (by purchase)
Cora Browning Cogswell, his wife, 1921 (by bequest)
Florence Pearl and Elizabeth C. Browning, Syracuse, New York, 1936 (by bequest)
M. Knoedler & Co., New York, until May 17, 1946
Butler Art Institute, Youngstown, Ohio, May 17, 1946, until October 1966 (acquired in exchange for Winslow Homer watercolor, On the Beach, Tynmouth; traded to Kennedy Galleries for Eastman Johnson, Joseph Warren of Troy, NY, Thomas Eakins, Bronze Skeleton of Horse, and George Caleb Bingham, James H. Craven)
Kennedy Galleries, Inc., New York, October, 1966–October 12, 1968
Mr. and Mrs. James W. Titelman, 1969–1972 (by purchase)
Kennedy Galleries, Inc., New York, 1975–June 1976
Virginia Steele Scott Foundation, June 1976–1983
The Huntington Library, Art Museum, and Botanical Gardens, San Marino, California, 1983 (by gift)
Exhibitions
1939 Brooklyn Museum
Brooklyn Museum of Art, Brooklyn, New York, An American Genre Painter: Eastman Johnson, 1824–1906, January 18, 1939–February 26, 1940. (Exhibition catalogue: Baur 1940), no. 50, as Sugaring Off (No. 2).1940 Douthitt Gallery
The Douthitt Gallery, New York, Eastman Johnson: The Keystone Artist, March 28–April 30, 1940. (Douthitt Gallery 1940), no. 2, as Sugaring Off (No. 2).1942 John Levy Galleries
John Levy Galleries, New York, Exhibition of Eastman Johnson, April 8–30, 1942. (John Levy Galleries 1942), no. 19, as Sugaring Off.1966 Whitney Museum
Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, Art of the United States, 1670-1966, September 28–November 27, 1966. (Exhibition catalogue: Goodrich 1966), no. 153, as Sugaring-off, Number 2, Lent by the Butler Institute of American Art.1972 Whitney Museum
Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, Eastman Johnson: Retrospective Exhibition, March 28–May 14, 1972. (Exhibition catalogue: Hills 1972a), no. 37, b/w illus., p. 67, as Sugaring Off, Collection of Mr. and Mrs. James W. Titelman. Traveled to: The Detroit Institute of Arts, Detroit, June 7–July 22, 1972; Cincinnati Art Museum, Cincinnati, August 15–September 30, 1972; Milwaukee Art Center, Milwaukee, October 20–December 3, 1972.1974 Whitney Museum
Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, The Painters' America, Rural and Urban Life, 1810–1910, September 20–November 10, 1974. (Exhibition catalogue: Hills 1974), no. 61, b/w illus., as Sugaring Off. Traveled to: The Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, December 5, 1974–January 19, 1975; Oakland Museum, Oakland, California, February 10–March 30, 1975.1977 Westmoreland Museum
The Westmoreland Museum of American Art, Greensburg, Pennsylvania, Collection of The Virginia Steele Scott Foundation of Pasadena, January 23–March 6, 1977, no. 34, as Sugaring Off.References
Johnson, Eastman 1864b
Eastman Johnson letter to John Coyle, March 13, 1864, Johnson states that he plans to do a "larger & more pretenscious [sic]" sugaring picture and is "starting for the country to make studies for a month or six weeks"; that this is his fourth annual trip to Maine to do so; and that he "hope[s] to paint it next autumn & winter," quoted in Selection of Artist’s Letters 1999.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. 151, as Sugaring Off.American Art News 1907b
"Eastman Johnson Sale." American Art News 5, no. 20 (March 2, 1907).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), no. 50, as Sugaring Off (No. 2).Magazine of Art 1940
The Magazine of Art (January 1940), illus.John Levy Galleries 1942
Exhibition of Eastman Johnson. New York: John Levy Galleries, 1942. Exhibition catalogue (1942 John Levy Galleries), n.p. (3), no. 19, as Sugaring Off.Butler Art Institute 1951
Catalogue of the Permanent Collection of American Art. Youngstown, OH: Butler Art Institute, 1951, p. 49.Mellon and Wilder 1963
Mellon, Gertrude A., and Elizabeth F Wilder. Maine and Its Role in American Art. New York: Viking Press, 1963, pp. 98-99.Goodrich 1966
Goodrich, Lloyd. Art of the United States: 1670–1966. New York: Admiral Press, 1966. Exhibition catalogue (1966 Whitney Museum), p. 55.Kennedy Quarterly 1967
The Kennedy Quarterly 7, no. 1 (March 1967).Hills 1972a
Hills, Patricia. Eastman Johnson: Retrospective Exhibition. New York: Clarkson N. Potter, 1972. Exhibition catalogue (1972 Whitney Museum), no. 37, p. 67 illus., as Sugaring Off.Hills 1974
Hills, Patricia. The Painters' America: Rural and Urban Life, 1810–1910. New York: Praeger, 1974. Exhibition catalogue (1974 Whitney Museum), p. 33, fig. 38, illus., as Sugaring Off.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), p. 53, fig. 34, as Sugaring Off.Selection of Artist's Letters 1999
"A Selection of the Artist's Letters." In Eastman Johnson: Painting America, by Teresa A. Carbone and Patricia Hills. Brooklyn, NY: Brooklyn Museum of Art, in association with Rizzoli International Publications, 1999. Exhibition catalogue.Hills Examination / Opinion
Examination date(s): Examination date not recorded, but probably 1971 when Hills organized the Whitney exhibition
Examination notes: Smoke rises into the sky. Sky clear on right. Lots of reds and touches of turquoise. Red brown foreground.
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Record last updated May 27, 2022. Please note that the information on this and all pages is periodically reviewed and subject to change.
Citation: Hills, Patricia, and Abigael MacGibeny. "Sugaring Off, c.1861–65 (Hills no. 13.4.7)." Eastman Johnson Catalogue Raisonné. www.eastmanjohnson.org/catalogue/entry.php?id=175 (accessed on April 25, 2024).