Country Squire

Dateca. 1850

Attributed to John James Trumbull Arnold 1812 - ca. 1865

MediumOil on canvas

DimensionsUnframed: 34 1/8 x 28in. (86.7 x 71.1cm) and Framed: 39 1/4 x 32 1/2in.

Credit LineGift of Abby Aldrich Rockefeller

Object number1937.100.2

DescriptionOil portrait of man seated, half-length against a grey background. He is seated in a bird's eye maple side chair, he holds a red book with yellow end papers in his right hand with his finger marking the page and his elbow on the back of the chair. The little finger if that hand has a ring with a red stone surrounded with pearls on it. He wears a gold watch chain on his vest with a heart shaped slide fastener and the watch is tucked into his vest on his left. He wears a black coat with fairly wide lapels, a black vest which is buttoned, a white shirt with a high collar touching his cheeks, and a black tie tied in a bow. He has brown hair worn smoothly to his ears, and a slightly receding hairline with a widows's peak, pronounced arching eyebrows, thin sideburns, obvious eyelashes, and blue eyes, and thin lips.Label TextAs in companion likenesses of John and Agnes Dunbar painted in York County, Pennsylvania, in 1853-1854, the artist has not bothered to adhere to the convention of posing these two sitters slightly turned toward each other, although there is little doubt they form a pair. Many hallmarks of John James Trumbull Arnold's style are evident, including soft gray brown shading of the eyelids and tiny dark eyelashes that sprout from them one by one. Their hands demonstrate Arnold's typical treatment, consisting of linear definition, minimal modeling, crisply outlined nails, and depiction within a flat plane. Fingers are held together, and even if they are separated, as the mans are by his book, they appear unconvincing and two-dimensional. The woman's left hand provides an amusing glimpse of Arnold's attempt to produce a more naturalistic bend in the fingers; since they are still positioned together and are flatly depicted, they cannot assume the required configuration with any semblance of realism and droop like soft wax candles.

Both sitters' costumes are enlivened by touches of jewelry, and the sweeping curves of their gold watch chains add graceful lines that stand out sharply against the black of waistcoat and dress. The man wears a ruby ring surrounded by pearls; his companion is unusually bedecked by almost any standard, being adorned in dangling pearl and filigree earrings, a hair bracelet, two brooches, a watch chain, five rings, and a head ornament! The title of "squire" was undoubtedly an early twentieth-century tongue-in-cheek reference to the couple's profusion of finery.
ProvenanceFound in New Jersey and purchased from Edith Gregor Halpert by Mrs. Rockefeller. Given to C. W. in 1939 by Mrs. John D. Rockefeller, Jr. Origin, probably Pennsylvania, Maryland, Virginia or W.Va