Great Falls of the Potomac
1873
Painter, American, 1811 - 1892
Artwork overview
-
Medium
oil on canvas
-
Credit Line
-
Dimensions
overall: 86.36 × 114.3 cm (34 × 45 in.)
framed: 144.15 × 116.84 × 13.97 cm (56 3/4 × 46 × 5 1/2 in.) -
Accession
2016.22.18
Artwork history & notes
Provenance
William Wilson Corcoran [1798-1888], Washington; gift 1873 to the Corcoran Gallery of Art, Washington;[1] acquired 2016 by the National Gallery of Art.
[1] The Corcoran Gallery of Art's Accession Record Sheet (in NGA curatorial files) gives the date 10 May 1869 as the date of the painting's acquisition by Board Meeting action, and the painting's Corcoran accession number was [18]69.47. The 1869 date is apparently at odds with the 1873 date inscribed with the artist's signature, however additional notes on the Accession Record Sheet, taken from the "Old Register," indicate that "by permission of the Trustees [this painting] was substituted by the artist for one of inferior value in W. Corcoran's collection..." It appears that this 1873 painting then received the 1869 accession number of the painting it replaced in the collection.
Associated Names
Exhibition History
1901
Extended loan to Louise Home, Washington, 16 May 1901 - 3 May 1923.
1952
Tribute to W. W. Corcoran, George Washington University, Washington, October 1952.
2000
Virginia Landscape, Virginia Historical Society, Richmond; Historical Society of Western Virginia, Roanoke, 2000-2001 (shown only in Roanoke).
2005
William MacLeod: Painter and Curator, Corcoran Gallery of Art, Washington, 10 September - 7 November 2005, no. 9, unpublished checklist.
Bibliography
1873
"Art Notes." Evening Star. (23 April 1873).
1874
Bouligny, M. E. P. A Tribute to W. W. Corcoran of Washington City. Philadelphia, 1874: 70-71.
"The Corcoran Gallery." Evening Post (6 April 1874).
"The Corcoran Gallery: An Hour's Stroll Through The Collection." Evening Star (17 January 1874): 1: 3-5.
1966
Phillips, Dorothy W. A Catalogue of the Collection of American Paintings in The Corcoran Gallery of Art, Vol. 1: Painters born before 1850. Washington, 1966: 79.
1983
Cosentino, Andrew J., and Henry H. Glassie. The Capital Image: Painters in Washington, 1800-1915. Washington, DC: Smithsonian Institution Press, 1983, p. 107, no. 55.
2011
Cash, Sarah, ed. Corcoran Gallery of Art: American Paintings to 1945. Washington, 2011: 307, repro.
Inscriptions
lower left: W. MacLeod, 1873
Wikidata ID
Q46629978