Matilda Caroline Cruger
c. 1795
Painter
West Building Ground Floor, Gallery G41-B
Artwork overview
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Medium
oil on canvas
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Credit Line
-
Dimensions
overall: 91.7 x 71.6 cm (36 1/8 x 28 3/16 in.)
framed: 123.2 x 102.2 x 7 cm (48 1/2 x 40 1/4 x 2 3/4 in.) -
Accession
1942.8.13
Artwork history & notes
Provenance
Maria Taylor Hunt [Mrs. Ward Hunt, d. 1912], Utica, New York;[1] bequeathed to her niece, Caroline Matilda Van Rensselaer Hillhouse [Mrs. Phineas P. Hillhouse], Cambridge, Massachusetts;[2] (Charles Henry Hart, New York, and Frank W. Bayley, Boston); sold 1917 to Franklin Bulkeley Smith [1864-1918], Worcester, Massachusetts;[3] (his estate sale, American Art Association, New York, 23 April 1920, no. 141); purchased by W. S. Burke for Thomas B. Clarke [1848-1931], New York;[4] his estate; sold as part of the Clarke collection on 29 January 1936, through (M. Knoedler & Co., New York), to The A. W. Mellon Educational and Charitable Trust, Pittsburgh; gift 1942 to NGA.
[1] Henry T. Tuckerman, Book of the Artists: American Artist Life Comprising Biographical and Critical Sketches of American Artists, New York, 1867, 5th printing, 1870, reprint, New York, 1966, 109, 628, and George C. Mason, The Life and Works of Gilbert Stuart, New York, 1879, 282, list the portrait as owned by her husband Ward Hunt. Mrs. Hunt is listed as the owner in Museum of Fine Arts, "Portraits Painted by Stuart...taken from Mason's Life and Works of Gilbert Stuart." Exhibition of Portraits Painted by Gilbert Stuart, Boston, 1880, 61. Mrs. Hunt is the first documented owner of the portrait, which was assumed to have come to her from her stepmother Caroline Matilda Yates Taylor [Mrs. James Taylor, d. 1866], Albany, New York, the sitter's daughter.
[2] Maria T. Hunt's will (Surrogate's Court, Oneida County, New York; copy, NGA curatorial file) lists her sister Sarah A. Van Rensselaer and her niece Caroline Van Rensselaer Hillhouse as her primary heirs; the inventory of her estate lists "2 family portraits (oil) with gold frames, latter damaged." Because Mrs. Van Rensselaer was deceased, Mrs. Hillhouse inherited the portraits. This provenance is repeated in American Art Association, Catalogue of the Frank Bulkeley Smith Collection Sale [23 April 1920], New York, Smith 1920, unpaginated, lot 141, which states that the portrait went to Mrs. Hillhouse under the terms of Mrs. Taylor's will.
[3] Lawrence Park, Gilbert Stuart: An Illustrated Descriptive List of his Works, with an Account of his Life by John Hill Morgan and an Appreciation by Royal Cortissoz, 4 vols., New York, 1926, 244-245.
[4] "Paintings Sold at Auction, Season of 1919-1920," American Art Annual 17 (1920), 331. The name of the seller and the date of purchase are recorded in a copy of Portraits by Early American Painters of the Seventeenth, Eighteenth and Nineteenth Centuries Collected by Thomas B. Clarke (Exh. cat., Philadelphia Museum of Art, 1928) annotated with information from files of M. Knoedler & Co., NY (copy in NGA curatorial records and in NGA library).
Associated Names
Exhibition History
1922
Portraits Painted in the United States by Early American Artists, The Union League Club, New York, February 1922, no. 17, as by Gilbert Stuart.
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 by Gilbert Stuart.
1943
American Paintings, National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C., 1943.
1944
Gilbert Stuart: Portraits Lent by the National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C., Virginia Museum of Fine Arts, Richmond, 1944-1945, no. 6
1947
American Paintings from the Collection of the National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C., 1947.
1948
American Paintings from the Collection of the National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C., 1948.
1949
American Paintings from the Collection of the National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C., 1949.
Exhibition of Early American Portraits on Loan from the National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C., Pack Memorial Public Library, Asheville, North Carolina, 1949, no. 6.
1950
The Face of American History, Columbia Museum of Art, South Carolina, 1950, no. 16, as by Gilbert Stuart.
1951
American Portraits from the National Gallery of Art, High Museum of Art, 1951, no. 15 (organized by the Atlanta Art Association).
1952
[Opening exhibition of new art gallery], Randolph-Macon Woman's College, Lynchburg, Virginia, 1952-1953, no cat.
Opening Exhibition of The George Thomas Hunter Gallery of Art, Chattanooga Art Association, Tennessee, 1952, unnumbered.
[Opening exhibition], Mint Museum of Art, Charlotte, North Carolina, 1952, no. cat.
1985
Extended loan for use by Ambassador Faith Whittlesey, U.S. Embassy residence, Bern, Switzerland, 1985-1988.
1988
Extended loan for use by Ambassador Philip D. Winn, U.S. Embassy residence, Bern, Switzerland, 1988-1990.
Bibliography
1867
Tuckerman 1867, 109, 628
1879
Mason, George C. The Life and Works of Gilbert Stuart. New York, 1879: 282.
1880
MFA 1880, 61, no. 683
1926
Park 1926, 244-245, no. 196, repro.
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 by Gilbert Stuart.
1933
Sawitzky, William. "Some Unrecorded Portraits by Gilbert Stuart." Art in America 21 (June, 1933): 84, 91-92
1964
Mount 1964, 169, 366
1970
American Paintings and Sculpture: An Illustrated Catalogue. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1970: 132, repro.
1980
American Paintings: An Illustrated Catalogue. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1980: 272, repro.
1992
American Paintings: An Illustrated Catalogue. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1992: 398, repro.
1995
Miles, Ellen G. American Paintings of the Eighteenth Century. The Collections of the National Gallery of Art Systematic Catalogue. Washington, D.C., 1995: 367-368, color repro. 369.
Wikidata ID
Q20180206