⊠45.1 U.S. Later Portrait Drawings, Men
When Johnson returned from Europe late in 1855 and moved in with his family in Washington, D.C., he began receiving portrait commissions. Like those done earlier, Johnson generally used charcoal (named in some records as black chalk) with touches of white and created a strong chiaroscuro for his sitters. Gradually he moved away from the strong chiaroscuro style he had been using, and his later portraits tend to be sketchier (as was the taste in art at the time) but no less professional. He used pastel to bring in color in some of these portraits. —PH
View all works in this theme »
Hills no. 45.1.10
Baur no. 305
Frederic James De Peyster
Alternate titles: Fred de Peyster; Frederick [sic] De Peyster; Frederick [sic] J. De Peyster
c.1888
Charcoal and white chalk on gray paper
17 x 12 in. (43.2 x 30.5 cm) (sight)
Neither signed nor dated
loading
Labels
Label on verso: 24 x 18 [possibly frame size]
Exhibitions
Kennedy Galleries, New York, Charcoal Drawings of Eminent Americans by Eastman Johnson, June 1920. (Exhibition catalogue: Kennedy Galleries 1920), no. 8, as
Frederick [sic] De Peyster.
Macbeth Gallery, New York, Exhibition of a Private Collection of Drawings by Eastman Johnson, January 14–February 3, 1936.
References
Catalogue of an Exhibition of Charcoal Drawings by Eastman Johnson. New York:
Kennedy Galleries,
1920.
Exhibition catalogue (1920 Kennedy Galleries), p. 5, no. 8, as
Frederick [sic] De Peyster.
Bolton, Theodore. Early American Portrait Draughtsmen in Crayon. New York:
F. F. Sherman,
1923, p. 39, no. 4
.
Comstock, Helen. "The Connoisseur in America: Eastman Johnson's Drawings." The Connoisseur (May 1936), p. 278
.
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. 74, no. 305, as
Frederick [sic] J. De Peyster.
Hills Examination/Opinion
Examination date(s): March 30, 1971
Examination notes: Strange eyes. His right eye is lower than his left. Odd owl-like left eye. See Kennedy cat. for bio.
Sitter Biography
Sitter: De Peyster, Frederic James
Biography: Frederic James De Peyster (1839–1905). New York City lawyer and philanthropist. Son of Captain James Ferguson De Peyster and Frances Goodhue Ashton; married Augusta McEvers Morris (m. 1871); father of Helen Van Cortland, Frederic Ashton, Francis Goodhue, Augusta Morris and Ella Morris [New York Times, May 12, 1905, p. 9].
White, Terry James. The National Cyclopaedia of American Biography. Ann Arbor, MI: University Microfilms, 1967–.
De Peyster, Frederic James
Keywords
- Portrait pose:
- Occupations:
- Subject matter:
Record last updated June 30, 2024. Please note that the information on this and all pages is periodically reviewed and subject to change.
Citation: Hills, Patricia, and Abigael MacGibeny. "Frederic James De Peyster, c.1888 (Hills no. 45.1.10)." In Eastman Johnson Catalogue Raisonné. www.eastmanjohnson.org/catalogue/entry.php?id=969 (accessed on May 1, 2025).
