Possibly Miss Huston

Dateca. 1825

MediumWatercolor, pencil and gouache on wove paper

DimensionsPrimary support: 7 3/16 x 6in. (18.3 x 15.2cm) and Framed: 10 1/4 x 7 3/4in.

Credit LineAcquisition partially funded by Mr. and Mrs. William T. Earls, Sr.

Object number1977.300.2

Description1/2 length water color portrait of a young woman in dull, plum-colored dress; she sits sideways in a decorated, green-painted Windsor chair with bamboo turnings. She faces very slightly to right, her body nearly full-front, her face only slightly less so. Her far hand rests on the back of the chair, her near one rests in her lap and holds a brown-speckled (apparently leather-bound) book. Her medium-brown hair is parted in the middle and smooth over the crown, but a great mass of tight curls in grouped over each ear on the sides. She wears a very large tortoise-shell comb in her hair at back and, in front of this, a spray of pink, white and blue flowers with bits of foliage. She has a pleasant expression with small, pursed but slightly upturned lips, pale blue eyes with thin arching eyebrows. On the upper far side of her head, part of a dotted ribbon (or, more likely a flat, tortoise-shell comb) appears, flat to her head. Around her neck is single strand choker of coral beads. The collar of her dress is white, wide (nearly to her shoulders) and lobed and edged with a simple embroidery. At center front of her collar appears a red, circular pin. Hanging beneath her collar and extending down below the waistline of her dress is a long, single strand of rust-colored beads (or a chain; the delineation here is not very distinctive). Also, around her neck, but beneath her large collar and visible only in front, is a pale blue fringed scarf or shawl; the pointed ends in front are pulled to one side, one seems to be tucked into her belt. At her waist, somewhat higher than the normal waist line is a pale blue decorated (enameled?) buckle; the belt is a kind of sash, draped in a small loop on her side, two ends hanging loose at the far side. Her sleeves ae quite long, slightly puffed over the shoulders, and horizontally banded at the center of the upper arm; small rosettes appear just above the banding. Above the banding is a diagonally-placed strip of white ruching, caught --over the upper arm-- by a pale blue bow on either side. The water color is terminated at bottom (just above her knee level) by a dark watercolor border or line.
Label TextThe young woman's costume, accessories, and coiffure indicate that she made a concious effort to look her best on the day her portrait was painted. Folk portraits were often placed in imaginatively conceived frames that compliment the colors and patterns in the picture rather than simply provide a neutral border. This grain-painted frame with mother-of-pearl accents is patterned after an eighteenth-century looking glass frame.
MarkingsIn pencil in modern script on Japanese mulberry paper backing the primary support, at the top, is "Just as it is I-16 x 20 W. Color," and at bottom, also on the backing paper, "I-16 x 20 Water Color Haw...(illeg., Hawtyns?) Studio, Fairchance, Pa." No watermark found.
ProvenanceEdgar William and Bernice Chrysler Garbisch, New York, N.Y.; Purchased from Southeby Parke Bernet with funds from William T. Earls.