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Photo: Courtesy of the Frick Art Reference Library
⊠31.1 U.S. Portraits, Men
When Johnson returned to the United States, he not only painted genre paintings but he also continued to paint portraits, which gave him a steady income. After 1880 Johnson turned to portraiture almost exclusively. During the 1880s and 1890s he painted businessmen, lawyers, university presidents, and three U.S. presidents from life. At times he also painted their wives and children.
He was also commissioned to paint posthumous portraits, often from photographs. These portraits by and large do not have the sparkle and active brushwork of those done from life. It seems that the demand for portraits of business and civic leaders (and members of exclusive men’s clubs) was so high that portrait painters would often make copies of each other’s paintings to satisfy the market for such images. In many instances, it has been difficult to render opinions for such paintings. —PH
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Hills no. 31.1.175
Baur no. 246
Robert Hewson Pruyn
Alternate title: Portrait of Robert H. Pruyn
1883
Oil on canvas
36 x 30 in. (91.4 x 76.2 cm)
Signed and dated lower right: E. Johnson 1883
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Exhibitions
Albany Bicentennial, Albany Academy, Albany, New York, Albany's Bicentennial Loan Exhibition, July 5–24, 1886. (Exhibition catalogue: Albany's Bicentennial 1886), no. 247, as
Portrait of Robert H. Pruyn, owner National Commercial Bank
.
References
Catalogue of Albany's Bicentennial Loan Exhibition. Albany, NY:
Weed, Parsons, & Co.,
1886.
Exhibition catalogue (1886 Albany Bicentennial), p. 125, no. 247, as
Portrait of Robert H. Pruyn, owner National Commercial Bank.
Catalogue of an Exhibition of Charcoal Drawings by Eastman Johnson. New York:
Kennedy Galleries,
1920.
Exhibition catalogue (1920 Kennedy Galleries), p. 12, addendum “Paintings by Eastman Johnson" [possibly, as
Robert Hewson Pruyn]
.
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), p. 71, no. 246, as
Robert Hewson Pruyn.
The Faces of the City: Albany Portraits for Three Centuries. Albany, NY:
University Art Gallery of the University at Albany,
1986.
Exhibition catalogue (1986 SUNY Albany), p. 54, no. 30
.
Sitter Biography
Sitter: Pruyn, Robert Hewson
Biography: Robert Hewson Pruyn (1815–1882). Legislator and diplomat. Elected speaker of the assembly in 1854; appointed minister to Japan by President Lincoln in 1861. For many years was president of the National Commercial Bank of Albany, New York. Married early in life to Jane Ann Lansing; father of two children.
White, Terry James. The National Cyclopaedia of American Biography. Ann Arbor, MI: University Microfilms, 1967–.
Keywords
- Portrait pose:
- Posthumous:
Robert Hewson Pruyn [Edward Lansing Pruyn after Johnson]
c.1905
Oil on canvas
36 x 30 3/16 in. (91.4 x 76.7 cm)
Inscribed on verso of stretcher bar, upper center, in graphite: Robert H. Pruyn
Collection Zimmerli Art Museum at Rutgers University, Gift of Robert C. Pruyn, the sitter's son (0114)
See all Period Portrait Copies by Other Artists after Johnson.
Record last updated September 15, 2021. Please note that the information on this and all pages is periodically reviewed and subject to change.
Citation: Hills, Patricia, and Abigael MacGibeny. "Robert Hewson Pruyn, 1883 (Hills no. 31.1.175)." In Eastman Johnson Catalogue Raisonné. www.eastmanjohnson.org/catalogue/entry.php?id=623 (accessed on October 8, 2024).
