William Amory Gardner
artist
William Morris Hunt
(Brattleboro, Vermont, 1824 - 1879, Appledore Island, Maine)
Date1873
Place MadeUnited States, North America
MediumCharcoal on buff laid paper
Dimensions52 x 42 cm (20 1/2 x 16 9/16 in.)
ClassificationsDrawings
Credit LineIsabella Stewart Gardner Museum, Boston
Accession numberP17e26
eMuseum ID720550
EmbARK ObjectID12256
TMS Source ID1390
Last Updated8/9/24
Status
Not on viewWeb CommentaryThis charcoal of William Amory Gardner by William Morris Hunt depicts the sitter at age 10. William Amory Gardner was Isabella Stewart Gardner’s nephew. When William Amory’s father, Joseph Peabody Gardner, died in 1875, Isabella and her husband, Jack, raised twelve-year-old William Amory and his two brothers as their own. Isabella placed several pieces by Hunt throughout the museum.
BibliographyNotesPhilip Hendy. Catalogue of Exhibited Paintings and Drawings (Boston, 1931), p. 191.
Gilbert Wendel Longstreet and Morris Carter. General Catalogue (Boston, 1935), p. 127.
“Notes, Records, Comments.” Gardner Museum Calendar of Events 6, no. 15 (9 Dec. 1962), p. 2.
Rollin van N. Hadley (ed.). Drawings: Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum (Boston, 1968), pp. 36-37, no. 17.
Philip Hendy. European and American Paintings in the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum (Boston, 1974), p. 125.
Gilbert Wendel Longstreet and Morris Carter. General Catalogue (Boston, 1935), p. 127.
“Notes, Records, Comments.” Gardner Museum Calendar of Events 6, no. 15 (9 Dec. 1962), p. 2.
Rollin van N. Hadley (ed.). Drawings: Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum (Boston, 1968), pp. 36-37, no. 17.
Philip Hendy. European and American Paintings in the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum (Boston, 1974), p. 125.
MarksNotesSigned in charcoal (above the sitter's right shoulder, in monogram): W M H
Indecipherable watermark
Indecipherable watermark
ProvenanceNotesProbably made in preparation for an oil painting of the same subject (current location unknown), for which this drawing is the preliminary sketch, commissioned by Joseph Peabody Gardner (1828-1875), the father of the sitter classicist William Amory Gardner (1863-1937), in 1873.
The oil painting and likely this drawing entered Isabella Stewart Gardner's collection, when she and her husband, John L. Gardner, Jr. (1837-1898), adopted their three orphaned nephews including the sitter, William Amory Gardner, on 11 June 1875.
The oil painting and likely this drawing entered Isabella Stewart Gardner's collection, when she and her husband, John L. Gardner, Jr. (1837-1898), adopted their three orphaned nephews including the sitter, William Amory Gardner, on 11 June 1875.
Object/Provenance
