Muster Day

1843 or after

Charles Henry Granger

Painter, American, 1812 - 1893

Charles Henry Granger

Attributed to

Approximately two dozen people gather around a man standing with his mouth wide open and holding up two objects in a scarlet-red structure on a horse-drawn cart in this horizontal painting. The people appear to all have pale skin and most are men. Near the center of the composition, the man in the cart wears a white robe over a black, high-collared garment and a tall charcoal-gray hat. A hatch on the red structure appears to be open, and he holds up what might be books or pamphlets. A ginger-brown horse stands behind him with its head bowed. In the crowd, the men wear black, brown, gray, dark blue, or olive-green clothing and hats. Two women are to the left. One wears a green gown with a pumpkin-orange shawl and a wide-brimmed bonnet. She faces away from us. She and two men talk near a stand where another man and woman sell food and drink. More people gather around a second stand or structure beyond this, and, in the lower left corner of the painting, a man with white hair and a hooked nose and chin sits by an open cart with a sign reading, “Bear O! Pi Aiggs.” A few men dance and others mill about to the right of the cart. Closer to us, one boy runs toward another as a soldier lies belly-down on the ground, holding a bayoneted rifle out toward a brown dog. The dog crouches with its mouth open. Beyond the dancers and onlookers, a field stretches back to wooded hills. In the field, more than a hundred people stand or march in lines. Lavender-tinged clouds pile up in the blue sky over the horizon, which comes about halfway up this composition.

Media Options

This object’s media is free and in the public domain. Read our full Open Access policy for images.

Artwork overview


Artwork history & notes

Provenance

Recorded as from New Hampshire. (Robert Schuyler Tompkins, Montague, Massachusetts), by whom sold in 1949 to Edgar William and Bernice Chrysler Garbisch; by bequest to NGA, 1980.

Associated Names

Exhibition History

1985

  • Extended loan for use by Clayton K. Yeutter, U.S. Trade Representative, Washington, D.C., 1985-1988.

1988

  • The Art of Charles Henry Granger (1812-1893), York Institute Museum, Saco, Maine, 1988, no cat.

1990

  • Extended loan for use by Secretary Jack Kemp, U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, Washington, D.C., 1990-1993.

1997

  • Loan for display with permanent collection, South Texas Institute for the Arts, Corpus Christi, 1997.

2008

  • Extended loan for use by Secretary Ed Schafer, U.S. Department of Agriculture, Washington, D.C., 2008.

2010

  • American Naive Paintings from the Garbisch Collection at the National Gallery of Art, Taubman Museum of Art, Roanoke, Virginia, 2010, no cat.

Bibliography

1992

  • Chotner, Deborah, with contributions by Julie Aronson, Sarah D. Cash, and Laurie Weitzenkorn. American Naive Paintings. The Collections of the National Gallery of Art Systematic Catalogue. Washington, D.C., 1992: 153-156, color repro. 155.

  • American Paintings: An Illustrated Catalogue. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1992: 189, repro.

Inscriptions

on sign at lower left: Bear O! Pi / Aiggs

Wikidata ID

Q20187060


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