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Florence Einstein
1905oil on canvas
23 7/8 in. x 20 1/8 in. (60.64 cm x 51.12 cm)
Henry Melville Fuller Fund and Currier Funds, 1979.25
Thomas Eakins
American
1844–1916
The painting Florence Einstein is one of a series of extremely personal portraits of women Thomas Eakins made around the turn of the century. Among the best known of these are Mary Adeline Williams (Addie) (ca. 1900, Philadelphia Museum of Art), Susan MacDowell Eakins (ca. 1900, Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden, Smithsonian Institution, Washington, DC), and the poignant Mrs. Edith Mahon (1904, Smith College Art Museum, Northampton, MA). Most of these were not official commissions but represented members of Eakins's family circle in Philadelphia, close friends, or admired colleagues. Florence Einstein (d. 1919) was the head of the Department of Theoretical and Technical Design at the Philadelphia School of Design for Women (later Moore College of Art), which since 1886 had been headed by Emily Sartain, a longtime friend of Eakins's. Einstein and Eakins also had known each other for many years; among the tokens of connection between them is a collotype (1876, Philadelphia Museum of Art) of Eakins's dramatic painting The Gross Clinic (1876, Thomas Jefferson University, Philadelphia), which Eakins dedicated "To Florence A. Einstein/from her friend Thomas Eakins."
As is typical of this group of portraits, Eakins shows his subject at bust-length, against a blank background, without any props or attributes of her profession. He shows Florence Einstein in a soft, floral-patterned dress and shawl that emphasize her femininity and are, in their almost girlish delicacy, somewhat at odds with the plainness of her features and the sobriety, even sadness, of her expression. Eakins used the profile format infrequently; here, by silhouetting Einstein's strongly modeled features against a dark background, he gives her the dignity of a classical portrait bust. At the same time, she seems anxious, worn by care. Eakins's biographer, Lloyd Goodrich, noted that "Like Rembrandt, Eakins loved old age…and sometimes made sitters look older than they were" (Thomas Eakins, 1982, vol. 2, p. 59). Thus Florence Einstein, who graduated from the Philadelphia School of Design for Women in 1887 and could be as young as thirty-eight in this picture, exhibits the puffy skin, downturned mouth, and disappointments of an older woman.
CT
REFERENCES
Marian S. Carson. "Notes on a Portrait by Thomas Eakins." The Currier Gallery of Art Bulletin, Fall 1981, pp. 14-19.
Lloyd Goodrich, Thomas Eakins. 2 vols. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1982.
As is typical of this group of portraits, Eakins shows his subject at bust-length, against a blank background, without any props or attributes of her profession. He shows Florence Einstein in a soft, floral-patterned dress and shawl that emphasize her femininity and are, in their almost girlish delicacy, somewhat at odds with the plainness of her features and the sobriety, even sadness, of her expression. Eakins used the profile format infrequently; here, by silhouetting Einstein's strongly modeled features against a dark background, he gives her the dignity of a classical portrait bust. At the same time, she seems anxious, worn by care. Eakins's biographer, Lloyd Goodrich, noted that "Like Rembrandt, Eakins loved old age…and sometimes made sitters look older than they were" (Thomas Eakins, 1982, vol. 2, p. 59). Thus Florence Einstein, who graduated from the Philadelphia School of Design for Women in 1887 and could be as young as thirty-eight in this picture, exhibits the puffy skin, downturned mouth, and disappointments of an older woman.
CT
REFERENCES
Marian S. Carson. "Notes on a Portrait by Thomas Eakins." The Currier Gallery of Art Bulletin, Fall 1981, pp. 14-19.
Lloyd Goodrich, Thomas Eakins. 2 vols. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1982.
Exhibition
1944 Philadelphia Museum of Art. "Thomas Eakins Centennial Exhibiton, 1844-1944. April 8 - May 14. 1961-62 The National Gallery of Art, Washington, DC. "Thomas Eakins: A Retrospective Exhibition" additional venues: The Art Institute of Chicago, Phildelphia Museum ofArt. Oct. 8, 1961 - March 18, 1962. no. 94
1965 Philadelphia Museum of Art, "The Mr. and Mrs. Sturgis Ingersoll Collection" May-June.
1980 Currier Gallery of Art, Manchester, NH, "Accessions of the Fiftieth Year." Jan. 12 - March 2.
1986 Bowdoin College Museum of Art, Brunswick, ME, "Masterpieces from the Currier Gallery of Art." Sept. 11 - Nov. 2.
1995-1997 "American Art from the Currier Gallery of Art." Organized by the Currier Gallery of Art and the American Federation of Arts. Traveled to: Orlando Museum of Art, Orlando, FL, Dec. 3, 1995 - Jan. 28, 1996; Society of the Four Arts, Palm Beach, FL, Mar. 15 - Apr. 7, 1996; Art Museum of Western Virginia, Roanoke, VA, Aug. 10 - Oct. 13, 1996; The Dixon Gallery and Gardens, Memphis, TN, Feb. 2 - Mar. 30, 1997; Frye Art Museum, Seattle, WA, Apr. 25 - June 22, 1997; Currier Gallery of Art, Manchester, NH, July 18 - Sept. 8, 1997, cat. no. 24.
2005 Currier Museum of Art, Manchester, NH, "Faces & Figures: Two Centuries of Portraiture." Jan. 28 - March 3.
Provenance
Given to Miss Einstein by T the artist, 1905 Bequethed to Miss Einstein's niece, Miss Corinne B. Arnold
Bequethed to Miss Arnold's brother, M. Edwin Arnold, Phildelphia
R. Sturgis Ingersoll, c. 1944
Sold at Sotheby Parke Bernet (property of R. Sturgis Ingersoll estate, lot 6), May 23, 1974
Sold Sotheby Parke Bernet (lot 64), 1979
Currier, 1979
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