Miniature of John L. Gardner III
primary
W. Caflin
(active 19th century)
subject
John Lowell Gardner III
(American, 1863 - 1865)
Dateabout 1865
Place MadeUnited States, North America
MediumWatercolor on leather with gold locket-frame
Dimensions4.4 x 3.5 cm (1 3/4 x 1 3/8 in.)
ClassificationsPaintings
Credit LineIsabella Stewart Gardner Museum, Boston
Accession numberU18w77
eMuseum ID727597
EmbARK ObjectID14133
Previous Number448
TMS Source ID2956
Last Updated8/9/24
Status
Not on viewWeb CommentaryIsabella Stewart Gardner commemorated her experience as a mother through the portraits enshrined in this case. Her child, John L. Gardner III (“Jackie”), died of pneumonia in 1865, just three months shy of his second birthday. Her grief was acute: Gardner had adored her blue-eyed little boy. When her husband’s nephews were orphaned a decade later, she and Jack Gardner raised the three boys as their own. Sadly, their nephew Joseph Peabody Gardner, Jr., also died as a youth. In a moving tribute, she placed his photograph alongside similar portraits of herself and Jack, and beneath a portrait of Jackie.
BibliographyNotesChristina Nielsen et. al. Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum: A Guide (New Haven, 2017), p. 5, ill.
Nathaniel Silver and Diana Seave Greenwald. Isabella Stewart Gardner: A Life (Boston, 2022), pp. 38-39, fig. 15.
Diana Seave Greenwald,"Isabella and the Complexities of Mother's Day," Inside the Collection (blog), Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum, 2 May 2023, https://www.gardnermuseum.org/blog/isabella-and-complexities-mothers-day.
Nathaniel Silver and Diana Seave Greenwald. Isabella Stewart Gardner: A Life (Boston, 2022), pp. 38-39, fig. 15.
Diana Seave Greenwald,"Isabella and the Complexities of Mother's Day," Inside the Collection (blog), Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum, 2 May 2023, https://www.gardnermuseum.org/blog/isabella-and-complexities-mothers-day.
MarksNotesEngraved (verso): John Lowell Gardner, 3rd, Born June 18th 1863, Died March 15th 1865
ProvenanceNotesEntered Isabella Stewart Gardner's collection after 15 March 1865.
