Eastman Johnson Catalogue Raisonné
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Photo: New Britain Museum of American Art
Frame
Photo: Patricia Hills
Detail
Photo: Patricia Hills
Detail
Photo: Patricia Hills
Detail
Photo: Patricia Hills
⊠
25.2 Women Outdoors
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 no. 25.2.11
Baur no. 63
Girls Picking Hollyhocks
New Britain Museum of American Art title: Hollyhocks
Alternate title: Girls and Hollyhocks
1876
Oil on canvas
23 3/4 x 30 1/2 in. (60.3 x 77.5 cm)
Signed and dated lower left: E. Johnson/1876
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Description/Remarks
Plaza Art Auction Galleries sale catalogue, 1932: "A group of young maidens in the opulent garments of the eighties are depicted in the act of pruning hollyhock stalks. An outstanding example of the art of this great American romanticist."
Markings
Inscription on verso of frame in chalk: [?]3 CLAREMONT
Provenance
Exhibitions
Century Association, New York, June 3, 1876, no. 5, as Girls Picking Hollyhocks.
The Union League Club of New York, New York, American Figure Painters, April 14–16, 1904, no. 16, as Hollyhocks, owner Phillips Phoenix, Esq.
Brooklyn Museum of Art, Brooklyn, New York, An American Genre Painter: Eastman Johnson, 1824–1906, January 18, 1939–February 26, 1940. (Exhibition catalogue: Baur 1940), no. 63, b/w illus., Pl. XXVII, as Hollyhocks.
Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, Eastman Johnson: Retrospective Exhibition, March 28–May 14, 1972. (Exhibition catalogue: Hills 1972a), no. 80, b/w illus., p. 80, as Hollyhocks. 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.
Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, The Painters' America, Rural and Urban Life, 1810–1910, September 20–November 10, 1974. (Exhibition catalogue: Hills 1974), no. 64, illus., as Hollyhocks. Traveled to: The Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, December 5, 1974–January 19, 1975; Oakland Museum, Oakland, California, February 10–March 30, 1975.
References
McEntee, Jervis. Diary, Volume I, 1872 May 10–1874 November 20. 1872–74. Jervis McEntee papers, 1796, 1848–1905, Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution, Monday, August 26, 1872, "I found Eastman very nicely situated in his home at Nantucket. The house and all its surroundings are very plain. All the furniture is what he has picked up there and he has no carpets and no useless furniture but it is very pleasant and cosy. He has a good large studio and had one fine study which he had made up in the town; a grape arbor with hollyhocks".
Furniture, Paintings, Tapestries, and Art Objects. New York: Plaza Art Auction Galleries, November 18–19, 1932. Sale catalogue, p. 65: "A group of young maidens in the opulent garments of the eighties are depicted in the act of pruning hollyhock stalks. An outstanding example of the art of this great American romanticist," as Hollyhocks.
Baur, John I. H. Notebook #1. 1938–41. John I. H. Baur papers, 1946–1979, Archives of American Art, Smithsonian Institution, p. 23, as Hollyhocks.
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), pp. 49, 63; no. 63, as Hollyhocks.
Hills, Patricia. Eastman Johnson: Retrospective Exhibition. New York: Clarkson N. Potter, 1972. Exhibition catalogue (1972 Whitney Museum), p. 80, no. 80, illus., as Hollyhocks.
Hills, Patricia. The Painters' America: Rural and Urban Life, 1810–1910. New York: Praeger, 1974. Exhibition catalogue (1974 Whitney Museum), p. 95, fig. 117, illus., as Hollyhocks.
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. 262, 266.
Hills Examination/Opinion
Examination date(s): 1970-09-15; 2019-12-07
Examination notes: 1970-09-15: Very strong contrast between light and shadow. Faces although detailed emphasize broad light and shadow areas. Good condition. Four figures in shadow of bower. Girl in dark clothes—arm around neck of girl in white. Hollyhocks are rose and pink—leaves and flowers in foreground are out of focus—path—broad strokes—turquoise skirt—red skirt to left. Pink dress in middle ground—white dress with blue ribbon. Bright light yellow greens.
2019-12-07: Nine figures displayed in various areas of sunshine and shadow among hollyhocks. Bold white strokes of white on the dress of the second most right figure showing the blinding white of sunlight. Sun on her cheek and neck. Hollyhock flowers are bursts of pink, red and white. Two figures on the left in shadow so white blouse of woman is subdued. Middle figure in sunlight but receding from the picture plane, so that white reflections are also tamped down. In the shadowed space of the arbor are four more figures: two standing women painted with little detail and in the very rear, two more figures, increasingly subdued in terms of details and light; one looks down over the shoulder of a seated woman looking back at her/him (gender is indefinite). The painting is a tour de force of the gradual lack of definition of figures as they recede into a more distant shadowed space.
2019-12-07: Nine figures displayed in various areas of sunshine and shadow among hollyhocks. Bold white strokes of white on the dress of the second most right figure showing the blinding white of sunlight. Sun on her cheek and neck. Hollyhock flowers are bursts of pink, red and white. Two figures on the left in shadow so white blouse of woman is subdued. Middle figure in sunlight but receding from the picture plane, so that white reflections are also tamped down. In the shadowed space of the arbor are four more figures: two standing women painted with little detail and in the very rear, two more figures, increasingly subdued in terms of details and light; one looks down over the shoulder of a seated woman looking back at her/him (gender is indefinite). The painting is a tour de force of the gradual lack of definition of figures as they recede into a more distant shadowed space.
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Record last updated June 20, 2021. Please note that the information on this and all pages is periodically reviewed and subject to change.
Citation: Hills, Patricia, and Abigael MacGibeny. "Girls Picking Hollyhocks, 1876 (Hills no. 25.2.11)." In Eastman Johnson Catalogue Raisonné. www.eastmanjohnson.org/catalogue/entry.php?id=345 (accessed on May 1, 2025).