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Eastman Johnson Catalogue Raisonné
Patricia Hills, PhD, Founder and Director | Abigael MacGibeny, MA, Project Manager

Catalogue Entry

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Photo: Smith College Museum of Art, Northampton, Massachusetts
Judith Farnum Chandler, 1847, September (Hills no. 43.3.1). Verso with inscription
Verso with inscription
Photo: Smith College Museum of Art, Northampton, Massachusetts
[ 43.3 U.S. Early Portrait Drawings, Women ]info
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43.3 U.S. Early Portrait Drawings, Women

Johnson's earliest recorded portrait drawings of women are dated 1845: his portrait of Dolley Madison that indicates the setting and one of his older sister Judith which shows head and neck only. Unlike the portraits of men, his portraits of women are softer in light-dark chiaroscuro and do not exhibit the muscular structure of the face as do those of men. Johnson consolidated his draughtsman’s talents during his sojourn in Boston, where he painted Henry Wadsworth Longfellow and his circle. He took about three days to complete a charcoal portrait. The style of the time was to present portraits in oval frames. 

See Technical Information on Johnson's Practices for a discussion of charcoal, black chalk, crayon, and pastel. —PH

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Hills no. 43.3.1
Baur no. 303
Judith Farnum Chandler
Smith College Museum of Art title: Portrait of Mrs. Jeremiah Chandler
Alternate titles: likely Grandmother in Retrospection; Mrs. Jeremiah Chandler
1847, September
Locale: Gorham, Maine
Graphite with white highlights on brown paper
8 x 6 in. (20.3 x 15.2 cm)
Signed and dated lower left, in pencil: E. Johnson./Sept. 1847-
Smith College Museum of Art, Northampton, Massachusetts, gift of Mrs. John Wintersteen (Bernice M. McIlhenny, class of 1925) (1951:202)
Description / Remarks

Five Colleges and Historic Deerfield Museum Consortium Collections Database, accessed January 31, 2022: "Old woman in long dark dress with white bonnet seated in a rocking chair near a window near a bed."

Markings
Inscribed on verso, upper center, in pencil: Grandmother Chandler / By Eastman Johnson / Gorham / Maine September 1847 / WKJ; lower left, in pencil: 1313
Provenance
Abraham Heebner Wintersteen, the artist's nephew-in-law (husband of Lucretia May, daughter of the artist's sister Harriet), by 1940
Bernice Marilla McIlhenny (Mrs. John S.) Wintersteen, his daughter-in-law, until 1951
Smith College Museum of Art, Northampton, Massachusetts, 1951 (by gift)
Exhibitions
1920 Kennedy Galleries
Kennedy Galleries, New York, Charcoal Drawings of Eminent Americans by Eastman Johnson, June 1920. (Exhibition catalogue: Kennedy Galleries 1920), no. 46, [likely, as Grandmother in Retrospection].
1939 Brooklyn Museum
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. 303, as Mrs. Jeremiah Chandler.
1974 Smith College Museum
Smith College Museum of Art, Northampton, Massachusetts, Selections from the Permanent Collection of American Drawings, May 15–June 3, 1974 and September 4–12, 1974.
1976 Smith College Museum
Smith College Museum of Art, Northampton, Massachusetts, American Faces/Faces by Americans, April 23–October 10, 1976.
1980 Berkshire Museum
Berkshire Museum, Pittsfield, Massachusetts, The American Scene: American Drawings from Independence to the Armory Show, 1776–1913, February 29–March 26, 1980.
References
Kennedy Galleries 1920
Catalogue of an Exhibition of Charcoal Drawings by Eastman Johnson. New York: Kennedy Galleries, 1920. Exhibition catalogue (1920 Kennedy Galleries), p. 9, no. 46 [likely, as Grandmother in Retrospection].
Baur 1940
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. 31, 74, no. 303, as Mrs. Jeremiah Chandler.
Sitter Biography
Sitter: Chandler, Judith Farnum (Mrs. Jeremiah Chandler)
Biography:

Judith Farnum Chandler (1764–1851). Johnson’s maternal grandmother; mother of Mary Kimball Chandler.

Chandler, Judith Farnum (Mrs. Jeremiah Chandler)
Keywords
Record last updated March 24, 2022. Please note that the information on this and all pages is periodically reviewed and subject to change.
Citation: Hills, Patricia, and Abigael MacGibeny. "Judith Farnum Chandler, 1847, September (Hills no. 43.3.1)." Eastman Johnson Catalogue Raisonné. www.eastmanjohnson.org/catalogue/entry.php?id=920 (accessed on May 5, 2024).