Catalogue Entry
Johnson’s wife, Elizabeth, no doubt turned his attention to representations of women alone—either in interiors or outside. Such women are often lost in thought and suggest sentient beings with an inner life. In my interviews with descendants of Johnson’s siblings, she is presented as an independent woman. Johnson painted her portrait in which she assumes the posture of a woman who thinks on her own (also see theme 31.3). —PH
Hills, 2022: 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: Independent curator Anne Knutson has suggested that the subject of this painting may have been inspired by the popular novel Ruth by Elizabeth Gaskell, first published in 1853: "The story revolves around a poor woman, Ruth, who rises up the socioeconomic ladder with a love interest, falls and is rehabilitated in the end."
Note that Lewis Morris Rutherfurd was portrayed three times by Johnson, but the significance of his name in the verso inscriptions on this painting is not known.
"Signed at the lower right, E. J.
Height, 18 ½ inches; width, 16 inches."
[Annotation: “42.50 / Owned by C. M. Kurtz. Sale 1910 (cat. no. 56)” and “Do not include” in Baur’s handwriting.]
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