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

Catalogue Entry

no image available
[ 17.0 First Nations Peoples at Murray Bay, Canada, 1869 ]info
⊠
17.0 First Nations Peoples at Murray Bay, Canada, 1869

Eastman Johnson married Elizabeth Williams Buckley of Troy, New York, in Troy in June 1869. In July, he painted three pictures in the tourist destination of Murray Bay (now known as La Malbaie), Quebec, Canada, suggesting that the newlyweds had traveled northwest for their honeymoon. It is significant, and indicative of Johnson's interests, that the paintings represent First Nations Peoples and their homes, rather than the people or landscapes of the resort area. —AM

View all works in this theme »

Hills no. 17.0.2
1907 Sale no. 80
Indigenous Woman in Wigwam Interior
1907 Sale title: The Old Squaw
1869, July
Locale: Murray Bay, Quebec, Canada
Oil
10 1/2 x 7 1/2 in. (26.7 x 19 cm)
Initialed and dated lower left: E. J., Murray Bay, July, 1869
Present whereabouts unknown
This catalogue raisonné strives to reproduce the available historical information, as it was written in the period, while acknowledging that readers today may find many of these terms objectionable or racist. Please see the Racist Language/Negative Stereotypes Statement »
Description / Remarks

Hills, 2021: There is no evidence that Johnson himself would have called the work “The Old Squaw,” as it is listed in the 1907 Estate Sale.  Like the representations in the other Murray Bay pictures, this work is likely a respectful image of an older woman, and hence the revised title.

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.

1907 Estate Sale info
No. 80: "This is the half-length figure of an old Indian woman, relieved against the deep gloom of the interior of the wigwam, in the door of which she sits in a contemplative attitude, holding her left hand to her cheek and resting her elbow on her right hand, which lies in her lap. She wears a gray turban and a red loose-sleeved jacket, and various bead and silver ornaments hang about her neck. On either side of the figure are poles of the wigwam, bound to which are long sheets of birch bark."
"Signed at the lower left, E. J., Murray Bay, July, 1869.
Height, 10 ½ inches; width, 7 ½ inches.
[Annotation: “32.50”]"
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. 80 (as The Old Squaw)]
Present whereabouts unknown
Exhibitions
1907a Century Association
Century Association, New York, Memorial Exhibition of Eastman Johnson, February 9–13, 1907, as The Old Squaw.
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. 80, as The Old Squaw.
Keywords
Record last updated April 7, 2022. Please note that the information on this and all pages is periodically reviewed and subject to change.
Citation: Hills, Patricia, and Abigael MacGibeny. "Indigenous Woman in Wigwam Interior, 1869, July (Hills no. 17.0.2)." Eastman Johnson Catalogue Raisonné. www.eastmanjohnson.org/catalogue/entry.php?id=222 (accessed on May 4, 2024).