The Finding of Moses

Dateca. 1740

OriginAmerica, New York, Schenectady (probably)

MediumOil on blue and white plain-weave linen

DimensionsUnframed: 27 1/4 x 35 1/8in. (69.2 x 89.2cm) and Framed: 33 3/16 x 41 3/16in.

Credit LineMuseum Purchase

Object number1964.101.2

DescriptionThe 3 1/4-inch cove-molded, black-painted frame with flat inner and outer edges is a modern replacement (the design derived from the original frame on 1964.101.1).

Artist unidentified.Label TextThe painting is the Folk Art Museum's earliest rendering of Exodus 2:1-10. It bears close sylistic and technical relationships to 1964.101.1, the Museum's other Hudson Valley scripture painting, yet different artists are believed to have been responsible for the two.

The FINDING OF MOSES seems to have been based on an illustrtion in one of two nearly identical editions of a Dutch Bible produced by Pieter and Jacob Keur of Dortrecht; the first appeared in 1719 [n. 1], the second in 1730. It has been suggested that the painter used a concave lens to facilitate translation of the print's vertical format into the oil's horizontal one, but it is also possible that some other, as yet undiscovered, version of the early print was used.Inscription(s)In white paint in the lower margin is "Exodus - 2 =".ProvenanceDescended in the Glen-Sanders family, Scotia, NY.