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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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Image courtesy of the Frick Art Reference Library
[ 43.4 U.S. Early Portrait Drawings, Women, Unidentified ]info
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43.4 U.S. Early Portrait Drawings, Women, Unidentified

The women in these portraits have not yet been identified by name. However, the drawings are known or believed to have been done in the United States, before Johnson went to Europe to learn to paint in late 1849, based on evidence including their inscriptions and the appearance of the sitters and style of the drawings when images are available. Further research may enable the sitters to be identified. —AM

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Hills no. 43.4.5
Baur no. 374
Head of a Woman
Alternate titles: A Woman; Mary Newton (Mrs. Hayes); Portrait of a Woman
c.1846–49
Locale: Likely Washington, D.C. or Boston, Massachusetts
Charcoal on light brown paper mounted on cloth
23 1/4 x 19 1/2 in. (59.1 x 49.5 cm) (oval, irreg.)
No inscriptions visible
Present whereabouts unknown
Description / Remarks

MacGibeny, 2022: This portrait was exhibited by Knoedler & Co. in 1946 as Mary Newton (Mrs. Hayes). However, the sitter does not resemble the subject of the better documented Johnson portrait of Mary Elizabeth Newton Hayes (Museum of Fine Arts, Boston), whose likeness has been confirmed by photographs.

Provenance
Likely Eastman Johnson estate/Mrs. Eastman Johnson, New York, 1906 (by bequest)
Albert Rosenthal, New Hope, Pennsylvania, until 1939 (likely by purchase from Mrs. Johnson in 1915)
Estate of Albert Rosenthal, with Albert Duveen, New York
Albert Duveen, New York, and M. Knoedler & Co., New York, February 8, 1946
M. Knoedler & Co., New York, until February 1, 1980
[Sotheby Parke Bernet Inc., New York, February 1, 1980 (not a public sale; transaction type unknown)]
Present whereabouts unknown
Exhibitions
1946 M. Knoedler & Co.
M. Knoedler & Co, New York, Paintings and Drawings by Eastman Johnson, January 7–26, 1946. (Exhibition catalogue: M. Knoedler & Co. 1946), no. 14, as A Woman. Traveled to: The California Palace of the Legion of Honor, San Francisco, March 1946 (California Palace 1946).
References
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), p. 77, no. 374, as Head of a Woman.
Hills Examination / Opinion
Examination date(s): March 22, 1971
Examination notes: Light highlights created by rubbing out with a stump, e.g. on eyes and lacy collar.
Related work
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Keywords
Record last updated March 27, 2022. Please note that the information on this and all pages is periodically reviewed and subject to change.
Citation: Hills, Patricia, and Abigael MacGibeny. "Head of a Woman, c.1846–49 (Hills no. 43.4.5)." Eastman Johnson Catalogue Raisonné. www.eastmanjohnson.org/catalogue/entry.php?id=932 (accessed on May 2, 2024).