Provenance

John Pierpont Morgan, Jr.

American, 1867 - 1943

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A rutted, dirt road curves from the bottom center of the canvas toward and behind a grove of tall trees to our left, beneath a pale blue sky with fluffy white clouds that fills the top two-thirds of this horizontal landscape painting. The broad, green canopies of the trees to our left create deep shade over twisting trunks, shrubs, and grasses. A narrow stream meandering alongside the road to our left reflects the moss, pine, and sage greens of the leaves. The land rises in a sloping bank to our right, and leads back to open fields with hedgerows that stretch to the horizon. Shorter, more spindly trees cluster along the bank in the distance. Tiny in scale, people are sprinkled throughout the landscape, either singly or in small groups. In the shade of the grove to our left, a man with dark pantaloons, a brown hat and coat, and a walking stick strolls along the road with a woman wearing a red skirt, a dark shirt, and a white apron and cap. Just off the curve of the road to our right, another man with a walking stick, tan hat, and dark gray pantaloons talks to a woman also wearing red, black, and white. Another person, slightly smaller in stature, stands between them. At a pond farther back from this trio, a man with a broad-brimmed hat sits fishing at the edge of the water. Barely visible, a house with a pitched roof, a tall, brick-red chimney, and a white picket fence peeks out from behind the trees beyond the pond. Finally, a man wearing a rust-orange coat, gray pantaloons with white stockings, and a tall hat, carrying a pole propped on his shoulder, walks toward us on a footpath running alongside the fields. Tall, cream-white clouds dot the pale blue sky above, and tiny dots of dark paint suggest flying birds. Soft sunlight pours across the countryside. The artist signed and dated the painting in small script in the lower right corner: “meijndert Hobbema F 1663.”
Meindert Hobbema, A Wooded Landscape, 1663, oil on canvas, Andrew W. Mellon Collection, 1937.1.61

A Wooded Landscape

Meindert Hobbema · 1663 · oil on canvas ·  Accession ID  1937.1.61

The head, shoulders, and chest of a man wearing a deep rose-red garment fills this vertical portrait painting. His body is angled slightly to our left, and he looks directly at us from the corners of his eyes. His brown hair falls across his forehead, sweeps down over his ears, and curls gently at the nape of his neck. His eyebrows arch over brown eyes, and he has a long, angular nose. His upper lip is full, and his mouth is closed. He has high cheekbones and a cleft in his chin. The high collar is a black band over the voluminous red garment, which falls in pleats or folds down his chest. His right hand, on our left, lifts to clutch the fabric near his chest, in the lower left corner of the painting, and he wears a gold ring on his pinky finger. The background behind the man fades from dark aquamarine blue across the top to pale arctic blue at his shoulders, which span the width of the composition.
Andrea del Castagno, Portrait of a Man, c. 1450, tempera on panel, Andrew W. Mellon Collection, 1937.1.17

Portrait of a Man

Andrea del Castagno · c. 1450 · tempera on panel ·  Accession ID  1937.1.17

A young woman with light skin carries a large basket propped on her hip down a steep dune in this horizontal watercolor, which is painted mostly in light slate blue, sage green, tan, and ivory white. She is near the top of the hill, to our left. Her reddish-brown hair is pulled back to the nape of her neck. She wears a long, steel-blue dress with the sleeves rolled up to her elbows and black clog-like shoes. The hill she stands on angles steeply down from almost the top left corner of the paper to just inside the lower right corner, and it is dotted with scrubby green grasses on sand-colored ground. The horizon line is very low, nearly along the bottom edge of the composition. In the deep distance, beyond the dune in the lower right corner, a small patch of blue water with a single sailboat is visible. The bright, hazy sky is nearly white.
Winslow Homer, Girl Carrying a Basket, 1882, watercolor over graphite on wove paper, Gift of Ruth K. Henschel in memory of her husband, Charles R. Henschel, 1975.92.4

Girl Carrying a Basket

Winslow Homer · 1882 · watercolor over graphite on wove paper ·  Accession ID  1975.92.4