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

Catalogue Entry

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Photo: Courtesy of Kennedy Galleries, Inc., New York
13.5 Maple Sugar Camps, 1860s—Small 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

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Hills no. 13.5.11
Baur no. 44 / 1907 Sale no. 70
Cardplay at the Camp
Alternate titles: Card Playing at Camp; Card Playing at Fryeburg; Card Playing at Fryeburg, Maine or Maple Sugar Campfire, Fryeburg, Maine; Card Playing at Fryeburg, Me.; Cardplaying at Fryeburg; Maple Sugar Camp Fire, Fryeberg, Maine; Maple Sugar Campfire at Fryeburg; Maple Sugar Campfire, Fryeburg, Maine; Sugaring Off, Card Playing
c.1861–65
Oil on canvas
18 7/8 x 29 1/8 in. (47.9 x 74 cm)
Signed lower right: E. Johnson
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 info
No. 70: "This is a corner of a large and busy sugar camp, showing a well-constructed board shelter, in front of which the great kettle, supported from a long birch pole, hangs over a large fire of logs. A small boy is attending the kettle, two men play cards in the shelter, and on the right a youngster has just brought a barrel of sap from the forest. The snow has been cleared away from in front of the hut and is piled high on all sides, and in the background is seen a large forest with a tinge of green, showing that spring is at hand."
"Signed at lower right, E. Johnson.
Height, 19 inches; length, 29 inches."
[Annotation: “105.00 / A. M. Henry (or Hendry)”]
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. 70 (as Cardplay at the Camp)]
A. M. Henry, February 26, 1907 (by purchase)
Estate of Francis P. Garvan, New York, by 1937
Frazier Gallery, New York, 1937 (as Card Playing at Fryeburg)
Private collection, Wheatley Hills, New York, by 1949
Wildenstein and Company, New York
Dr. and Mrs. Irving Levitt, 1971
Kennedy Galleries, Inc., New York, 1971–1972
Private collection, 1972 (by purchase)
Private collection, 1974 (by purchase)
Present whereabouts unknown
Exhibitions
1907a Century Association
Century Association, New York, Memorial Exhibition of Eastman Johnson, February 9–13, 1907, as Sugaring Off, Card Playing.
1937 Frazier Gallery
Frazier Gallery, New York, Eastman Johnson 1824–1906: Forerunner of Homer and Eakins, September–October 1937. (Hirschl 1937); (Frazier Gallery 1937a), no. 14, as Card Playing at Fryeburg.
1938 Springfield Museum of Art
Springfield Museum of Art, 1938. (Springfield Museum of Fine Arts 1938).
1938 Whitney Museum
Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, A Century of American Landscape Painting, 1800 to 1900, January 19–February 25, 1938. (Whitney Museum 1938), no. 29, as Card Playing at Fryeburg, Lent by the Estate of Francis P. Garvan.
1939 Metropolitan Museum of Art
The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, Life in America: A Special Loan Exhibition of Paintings Held during the Period of the New York World's Fair, April 24–October 29, 1939, no. 156, p. 117, as Maple Sugar Campfire, Fryeburg, Maine, lent from the Garvan Collection, Yale University.
1948 Wildenstein & Co.
Wildenstein & Co, New York, Eastman Johnson, Summer 1948. (Wildenstein 1948), no. 10, as Maple Sugar Camp Fire, Fryeberg, Maine.
1949 Los Angeles County Museum of History, Science, and Art
Los Angeles County Museum of History, Science, and Art, Los Angeles, Winslow Homer 1836–1910, Eastman Johnson 1824–1906, February 4, 1949–May 7, 1950. (Exhibition catalogue: LACMA 1949), no. 14, as Card Playing at Fryeburg, Maine or Maple Sugar Campfire, Fryeburg, Maine. Traveled to: Denver Art Museum, Denver, 1949; Fine Arts Gallery, San Diego, 1949 (Fine Arts Society of San Diego 1949); Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, 1949 (Fine Arts Society of San Diego 1949); Oklahoma Arts Center, Oklahoma City, 1949 (Fine Arts Society of San Diego 1949); Seattle Art Museum, Seattle, 1949 (Fine Arts Society of San Diego 1949); Takoma Art League, Takoma, Washington, 1949 (Fine Arts Society of San Diego 1949); Witte Memorial Museum, San Antonio, 1949 (Fine Arts Society of San Diego 1949).
1972 Kennedy Galleries
Kennedy Galleries, New York, American Masters: 18th and 19th Centuries, March 22–April 8, 1972. (Exhibition catalogue: Kennedy Galleries 1972), no. 42.
1972 Whitney Museum
Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, Eastman Johnson: Retrospective Exhibition, March 28–May 14, 1972. (Exhibition catalogue: Hills 1972a), no. 31, color illus., p. 44, as Card Playing at Fryeburg, did not travel. 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.
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. 70, as Cardplay at the Camp.
American Art News 1907b
"Eastman Johnson Sale." American Art News 5, no. 20 (March 2, 1907).
Frazier Gallery 1937a
Frazier Gallery. Eastman Johnson: 1824–1906: Forerunner of Homer and Eakins. New York: Frazier Gallery, 1937. Exhibition catalogue (1937 Frazier Gallery), p. 5, no. 14, as Card Playing at Fryeburg.
Springfield Museum of Fine Arts 1938
A Century of American Landscape Painting. Springfield, MA: Springfield Museum of Fine Arts, 1938. Exhibition catalogue (1938 Springfield Museum of Art), p. 27, no. 24.
Whitney Museum 1938
A Century of American Landscape Painting, 1800–1900. Whitney Museum of American Art, 1938. Exhibition catalogue (1938 Whitney Museum), p. 27, no. 29.
Metropolitan Museum of Art 1939
Life in America: A Special Loan Exhibition of Paintings Held during the Period of the New York World's Fair. New York: Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1939, p. 117, no. 156, as Maple Sugar Campfire, Fryeburg, Maine.
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. 44, as Maple Sugar Campfire, Fryeburg, Maine.
Burrows 1948
Burrows, Carlyle. New York Herald Tribune, June 6, 1948.
Wildenstein 1948
Eastman Johnson. New York: Wildenstein, 1948. Exhibition catalogue (1948 Wildenstein & Co.), no. 10.
Kennedy Galleries 1972
American Masters: 18th and 19th Centuries. New York: Kennedy Galleries, 1972. Exhibition catalogue (1972 Kennedy Galleries), no. 42 illus.
Hills 1972a
Hills, Patricia. Eastman Johnson: Retrospective Exhibition. New York: Clarkson N. Potter, 1972. Exhibition catalogue (1972 Whitney Museum), no. 31; p. 44 illus., as Card Playing at Fryeburg.
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.
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Keywords
Record last updated January 25, 2024. Please note that the information on this and all pages is periodically reviewed and subject to change.
Citation: Hills, Patricia, and Abigael MacGibeny. "Cardplay at the Camp, c.1861–65 (Hills no. 13.5.11)." Eastman Johnson Catalogue Raisonné. www.eastmanjohnson.org/catalogue/entry.php?id=184 (accessed on March 29, 2024).