Portrait of Thrypose Morrow (?-?)

Dateca. 1800

Attributed to Charles Peale Polk (1767-1822)

OriginAmerica, West Virginia, Jefferson County (probably)

MediumOil on canvas

DimensionsUnframed: 28 1/8 x 25 1/8in. (71.4 x 63.8cm) and Framed: 31 x 28 7/16in.

Credit LineMuseum Purchase

Object number1957.100.14

DescriptionOil portrait of young girl (woman) in oval, half-length. Black painted spandrels. Background beige with red curtain filling upper right corner of oval with delicate red fringe. Sitter faces slightly to her right. She wears a blue-grey empire waisted dress which has a double cords of royal blue at waistline which is tied under her left arm and in a bow with gold tassels. Very sheer delicate lace is seen at edges of short sleeves and around the neckline. She wears double strands of pearl chokers at her throat and a ribbon matching her dress in her hair with pearls wound in it. Her brown hair is curly and dressed at top with ringlets to her shoulders, Her nose pronounced, blue eyes, no eyelashes, and dangling gold earrings with pearl drops. Her skin is white, and the colors glowing and luminous. She is dressed identically to her twin sister, 57.100.13 Thrypone Morrow.
Label TextIn 1776, Charles Peale Polk joined the household of his famous uncle, Charles Willson Peale (1741- 1827), and there he learned to paint portraits alongside a number of first cousins. He never achieved the success or renown of his better known relatives, and occasional forays into other lines of business suggest that he derived an inadquate livelihood from portraiture. Nevertheless, his likenesses clearly illustrate his uncle's influence and, today, are avidly sought in their own right. Stylistic characteristics shared by uncle and nephew include strong facial lighting, exaggeratedly oval shaping of heads, and alert, expressive eyes. Both painters inclined to intense, saturated color, but Polk much more so than Peale.

Polk launched his career as a portraitist in Baltimore in 1785 and, later, worked in western Maryland, northern Virginia, and Philadelphia. By 1818 he was employed as a government clerk in Washington, D.C. When he died in 1822, he was living in Richmond County, Virginia.

The artist rendered a series of four portraits believed to represent a couple and their two daughters (the other acc. nos. are 1957.100.11, 1957.100.12, and 1957.100.14). Identities of the foursome as Amos and Matilda Morrow with daughters Thryphone and Thryphose are based on family tradition (see "Provenance"), but efforts to verify the names have not been successful to date. The girls' first names appear to derive from biblical ones (see Romans 16:12). The Morrows are thought to have moved to Jefferson County (now in West Virginia) from southeast Virginia.

The daughters' portraits and a 1799 Polk portrait of Juliet White are similar in composition and style, suggesting all three were done about the same time. Juliet White lived in Winchester, Virginia, not far from Jefferson County, so proximity underlines the likelihood.
ProvenanceNotes now in the archives of the Maryland Historical Society and originally made by historian J. Hall Pleasants about 1955, based on entries in a Worthington family bible, provide the basics for the following line of descent which, however, contains some gaps and has not yet been verified:

from the subject's parents to their granddaughter, Sarah Burch Morrow Worthington (Mrs. Robert Worthington)(1786-1821); to her daughter, Sarah Worthington Hawks (Mrs. Wells Joseph Hawks); to her husband, Wells Joseph Hawks (1814-1873); to his son (by his previous marriage to Sarah Smith), Arthur Wells Hawks (1848-1933); to his son, Arthur Worthington Hawks (1878-1949); to his wife, Rachel Marshall Hawks (Mrs. Arthur Worthington Hawks)(d. 1964); to dealer Robert Carlen, Philadelphia, Pa; M. Knoedler & Co., New York, NY, which was CWF's source.

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