Eastman Johnson Catalogue Raisonné
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Photo: Colby College Museum of Art, Waterville, Maine
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31.5 U.S. Portraits, Children and Adolescents
Johnson’s portraits of children and adolescents were often part of a larger commission to paint whole families. In some instances, the children had died and their parents wished to have a reminder of their loved ones. —PH
Hills no. 31.5.9
Baur no. 231
Harold McGuffey
c.1880
Locale: Nantucket, Massachusetts
Oil on canvas
19 1/2 x 16 in. (49.5 x 40.6 cm)
No inscriptions visible
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Markings
Inscribed on verso, lower left: Portrait of / Harold McGuffey / belonging to / Margaret D. McGuffey [space] Painted by / Eastman Johnson / in Nantucket c. 1882
Provenance
Exhibitions
Corcoran Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C., before 1930, short-term loan, as Harold McGuffey.
Dougherty Carr Arts Foundation, and elsewhere, Corpus Christi, Texas, Light and Shadow, South Texas Artmobile, Sixth Exhibit, September–May 1975. (Exhibition catalogue: Dougherty Carr Arts Foundation 1975).
Colby College Museum of Art, Waterville, Maine, The Lunder Collection: A Gift of Art to Colby College, July 13, 2013–June 8, 2014, as Harold McGuffey.
References
Kingsley R. MacGuffey letter to Mr. Minnegerode (Director of Corcoran Gallery of Art), October 23, 1929, Corcoran Gallery of Art Curatorial records, "There has come to me thro' the settlement of an estate an oil portrait of a young boy's head, the work of the late Eastman Johnson. For some years this hung in the Corcoran Gallery as a loan. If you would desire to have it permanently I shall be glad to have it crated and shipped at my expense. The boy was my brother Harold who died in infancy in Cincinnati…".
Hirschl, Norman. Eastman Johnson, 1824–1906: Forerunner of Homer and Eakins. New York: Frederic Frazier Inc., 1937. Exhibition catalogue (1937 Frazier Gallery), p. 8.
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. 70, no. 231.
Phillips, Dorothy W. A Catalogue of the Collection of American Paintings in the Corcoran Gallery of Art. Vol. 1: Painters Born Before 1850. Washington, DC: Corcoran Gallery of Art, 1966, p. 115, as Harold McGuffey.
Light and Shadow, South Texas Artmobile, Sixth Exhibit. Corpus Christi, TX: Dougherty Carr Arts Foundation, 1975. Exhibition catalogue (1975 Dougherty Carr Arts Foundation), n.p., as Harold McGuffey.
Solnit, Albert J. "Changing Psychological Perspectives About Children and Their Families." Children Today 5, no. 3 (May–June 1976), p. 6, illus.
Hills Examination/Opinion
Examination date(s): 1998-03-10
Sitter Biography
Sitter: McGuffey, Harold
Biography:
Harold McGuffey (1878–1881). Son of Alexander McGuffey and brother of William, the co-authors of the McGuffey Readers [A Catalogue of the Collection of American Paintings in the Corcoran Gallery of Art, vol. 1: Painters Born Before 1850, 1966].
Keywords
- Portrait pose
: - Ownership status
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Record last updated July 22, 2021. Please note that the information on this and all pages is periodically reviewed and subject to change.
Citation: Hills, Patricia, and Abigael MacGibeny. "Harold McGuffey, c.1880 (Hills no. 31.5.9)." In Eastman Johnson Catalogue Raisonné. www.eastmanjohnson.org/catalogue/entry.php?id=781 (accessed on May 1, 2025).