As Johnson got to know his nieces and also his daughter Ethel during their teen-aged years, he realized that they were not just genteel creatures who read books, but also smart young adults who read newspapers. Of all American artists, Johnson is perhaps the only artist (besides women artists such as Lily Martin Spencer and Mary Cassatt) who shows women reading newspapers. —PH
Hills, 2021: Similar to the figures in Girl at the Window and The Reverie, the figure is likely not a “little girl,” but an adolescent.
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.
MacGibeny, 2021: According to the Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, a "whatnot" is "a light open set of shelves for bric-a-brac."
"Signed at the lower right, E. J.
Height, 30 inches; width, 24 inches."
[Annotation: “40.00 / Cogswell”]
- Subject matter
: