Portrait of a Man, c. 1745

Not on View

Medium

oil on canvas

Dimensions

overall: 78.7 x 61 cm (31 x 24 in.)

framed: 94.3 x 76.5 x 5.4 cm (37 1/8 x 30 1/8 x 2 1/8 in.)

Credit Line

Andrew W. Mellon Collection

Accession Number

1947.17.71

Artists / Makers

European 18th Century (painter)

Image Use

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Inscription

lower right: Jn Mare. / Pinxt: / 1761

Provenance

(Rose M. de Forest [Mrs. Augustus de Forest], New York);[1] sold 19 February 1923 to Thomas B. Clarke [1848-1931], New York; his estate; sold as part of the Clarke collection 29 January 1936, through (M. Knoedler & Co., New York), to the A. W. Mellon Educational and Charitable Trust, Pittsburgh; gift 1947 to NGA.

[1] Mrs. de Forest provided the following provenance: John Watts [1715-1789], a friend of the sitter; Captain Stephen deLancey, North Salem, N.Y., his nephew; Hannah Sackett deLancey [1751-1836], his wife who later married Isaac Baldwin Jr. of Litchfield, Conn.; Samuel Sackett Baldwin [1781-1854], Litchfield, Conn., and Pompey Hill, N.Y., her son; Julia Titus [b. 1825], Geneva, N.Y., and Albany, his granddaughter. This provenance, used for thirteen paintings sold by de Forest to Clarke, has been determined to be false; see James W. Lane and Anna Rutledge, "110 Paintings in the Clarke Collection," 1952, 41-65, esp. 41-46 (typewritten manuscript in NGA curatorial files). See also the entries for 1947.17.24 and 1947.17.90 (Manuscript for systematic catalogue vol. 14 [American Paintings]), two paintings from this group.

Associated Names

Clarke, Thomas Benedict
Knoedler & Company, M.
Mellon Educational and Charitable Trust, The A.W.
de Forest, Rose M.

Exhibition History

1924: Exhibition of the Earliest Known Portraits of Americans by Painters of the Seventeenth, Eighteenth and Nineteenth Centuries, The Union League Club, New York, March 1924, no. 22, as Robert Monckton by John Mare.

1925: A Loan Exhibition of the Earliest Known Portraits of Americans Painted in This Country by Painters of the Seventeenth and Eighteenth Centuries, The Century Association, New York, 1925, no. 9, as Robert Monckton by John Mare.

1928: Portraits by Early American Artists of the Seventeenth, Eighteenth and Nineteenth Centuries, Collected by Thomas B. Clarke, Philadelphia Museum of Art, 1928-1931, unnumbered and unpaginated catalogue, as Robert Monckton by John Mare.

Bibliography

1924: Exhibition of the Earliest Known Portraits of Americans by Painters of the Seventeenth, Eighteenth and Nineteenth Centuries. Exh. cat. The Union League Club, New York, 1924: no. 22, as Robert Monckton by John Mare.

1925: A Loan Exhibition of the Earliest Known Portraits of Americans Painted in This Country by Painters of the 17th and 18th Centuries. Exh. cat. Century Association, New York, 1925: no. 9, as Robert Monckton by John Mare.

1928: Barker, Virgil. "Portraiture in America Before 1876." The Arts 13, no. 5 (May 1928): 280, repro., as Robert Monckton by John Mare.

1928: Portraits by Early American Artists of the Seventeenth, Eighteenth and Nineteenth Centuries, Collected by Thomas B. Clarke. Exh. cat. Philadelphia Museum of Art, 1928, unnumbered, as Robert Monckton by John Mare.

1951: Smith, Helen Burr. "John Mare (1739 - c. 1795), New York Portrait Painter, with Notes on the Two William Williams'." The New-York Historical Society Quarterly 35 (October 1951): 363, repro. 360, 391-392.

1967: Smith, Helen Burr and Elizabeth V. Moore. "John Mare: A Composite Portrait." The North Carolina Historical Review 44 (January 1967): 26, attribution and signature rejected.

1970: American Paintings and Sculpture: An Illustrated Catalogue. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1970: 80, repro., as Robert Monckton by John Mare (?).

1980: American Paintings: An Illustrated Catalogue. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1980: 197, repro., as Robert Monckton.

1992: American Paintings: An Illustrated Catalogue. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1992: 230, repro.