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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: Montgomery Museum of Fine Arts, Alabama
23.0 Children and Pets

A traditional theme in genre painting, but also seen in children’s portraits, are children interacting with their pets. Pets, then and now, were given to children to encourage responsibility and even empathy toward other creatures. Pictures in the theme Maine Haylofts (13.7) also include children and pets. —PH

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Hills no. 23.0.5
Girl in Landscape with Two Lambs
Alternate titles: possibly A Portrait—Girl with Lamb; possibly Girl with Sheep; Feeding the Lamb; Girl in a Pasture
1875
Oil on board
26 1/4 x 21 1/4 in. (66.7 x 54 cm)
Signed and dated lower right: E. Johnson/1875
Description / Remarks

Hills, 2021: Two inscriptions of the name Hartman on the verso of the corresponding small sketch, Feeding the Lamb, 1875, suggest that American art critic Sadakichi Hartmann was given the sketch by Mrs. Johnson in connection with his writing about this finished painting in "Eastman Johnson: American Genre Painter," The International Studio 34, 1908, p. 110.

Hills, “Eastman Johnson on Nantucket,” in Michael A. Jehle, ed., Picturing Nantucket: An Art History of the Island with Paintings from the Collection of the Nantucket Historical Association: Works by Artists Born before 1900 (Nantucket Historical Association, 2000): “Sheep and lambs were a special feature of Nantucket, and Johnson included them in pictures…In the early nineteenth century thousands of sheep roamed unattended over the island’s treeless moors; in fact the division of property among the earliest Anglo-American settlers made provisions for land to be held in common for the express purpose of sheep grazing. In time the sheep herds dwindled but they were still noteworthy in 1847 when Ralph Waldo Emerson visited the island. The poet wrote to his daughter about walking out of the town where he came to ‘a wide bare common stretching as far as you can see on every side, with nothing upon it but here & there a few nibbling sheep."

Labels
Labels on verso:

Collector's information label, upper center, printed in ink: 1984-0034/Girl With Lambs/Eastman Johnson (Removed and placed in object's accession file)

Gallery number or data label, center, printed in ink: Berry-Hill Galleries, Inc./743 Fifth Avenue New York, N.Y. 10022/212-371-6777/C 7523/EASTMAN JOHNSON (1824-1906)/ Girl in Landscape with Two Lambs/Oil on board/ 26 1/4 x 21 1/4 inches/Signed & dated (lower right)/"E. Johnson. 1875" (Removed and placed in object's accession file)

Verso, lower right of frame, printed in ink: 1984*0034/JOHNSON, GIRL W/LAMBS
Provenance
Possibly W. A. White, by 1879
Private collection, Irvington, New York, until 1982
Ira Spanierman, New York, 1982–1984
Berry-Hill Galleries, New York, 1984–October 3, 1984
Westervelt Company, October 3, 1984–March 23, 2011
Montgomery Museum of Fine Arts, Alabama, March 23, 2011 (by gift)
Exhibitions
1875b Century Association
Century Association, New York, March 6, 1875, no. 2, [possibly (as A Portrait–Girl with Lamb)].
1879 Brooklyn Art Association
Brooklyn Art Association, Brooklyn, New York, December 8–20, 1879, no. 141, [possibly (as Girl with Sheep)], owner W. A. White.
1987 Birmingham Museum
Birmingham Museum of Art, Birmingham, Alabama, American Masterpieces from the Warner Collection, January 31–March 29, 1987.
References
Hartmann 1908
Hartmann, Sadakichi. "Eastman Johnson: American Genre Painter." The International Studio 34 (April 1908), p. 110: “[Johnson] conscientiously studied the works of the great German painters of that period—Schadow, Lessing, Sohn and Bendemann, and found much to admire. Only their sentimentalism never appealed to him very strongly, and although he tried himself in that direction, as for instance, in The Kiss and Feeding the Lamb, the pictures painted under that influence do not bear the stamp of individuality of his other work," as Feeding the Lamb.
Berry-Hill Galleries 1985
American Paintings III. New York: Berry-Hill Galleries, Inc., 1985, p. 61 illus.
Douglass 1999
Douglass, Julie M. "Lifetime Exhibition History." 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, p. 261 (as A Portrait - Girl with Lamb); p. 262 (as Girl with Sheep).
Jehle 1999
Jehle, Michael A., ed. Picturing Nantucket: An Art History of the Island with Paintings from the Collection of the Nantucket Historical Association. Nantucket, MA: Nantucket Historical Association, 1999, p. 40, illus.
Hills 2000
Hills, Patricia. "Eastman Johnson on Nantucket." In Picturing Nantucket: An Art History of the Island with Paintings from the Collection of the Nantucket Historical Association, edited by Michael A. Jehle. Nantucket, MA: Nantucket Historical Association, 2000, p. 40, as Girl in a Pasture.
Montgomery Museum of Fine Arts 2010–11
Montgomery Museum of Fine Arts Annual Report. 2010–2011, cover and p. 3.
Hills Examination / Opinion
Examination date(s): 1984-06-15
Examination notes: No marks on back; varnish dribbled around edges. Looks like original frame; no marks. Grey day; soft grey green grass; daisies at left--four articulated, the rest suggested. Greyed topaz pink sky - sails showing through mist. Two lambs; distant lamb, soft--no details, but strongly suggested. Cream dress; topaz grey shadows; firm contour. Sash: red magenta; turquoise, gold and nondescript colors. She holds in her right hand a can. [See Hills card for sketch of can.] Wistful face: long nose, lips outlined - typical of Johnson's Cupid's bow (in perspective). Light graphite outline on face; firm modeling. Johnson sees in masses; note highlight under chin. High shoes--highlights on buttons. Cascading hair with grey-blue bow--a jiggle suggesting it. Sleeve of her right hand: strong contrast of dark and light. Creamy white over soft greyed umber (i.e., using underpainting, a la Couture). Flaw: hand somewhat small for figure.
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Record last updated December 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. "Girl in Landscape with Two Lambs, 1875 (Hills no. 23.0.5)." Eastman Johnson Catalogue Raisonné. www.eastmanjohnson.org/catalogue/entry.php?id=313 (accessed on March 28, 2024).