Provenance

Charles Richard John Spencer-Churchill, 9th Duke of Marlborough

Marlborough 9th Duke of

British, 1871 - 1934

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Cast in bronze, one woman stands over a second crouching woman in this free-standing sculpture. Both women are nude, muscular, and have long wavy hair pulled back under bands. The golden-brown surface of the bronze is highly polished and smooth. In this photograph, the standing woman’s body faces us. Representing Empire, her head is encircled with a ring of laurel leaves, and she lifts her left hand, to our right, high overhead to hold up a second crown of leaves. She looks down onto the second woman, representing Avarice, and presses her hand into the Avarice’s shoulder, pushing the latter down. Empire balances on one foot and presses the other into Avarice’s hips, also destabilizing the latter’s stance. Avarice falls back onto one hand, which grips a purse on the ground. Avarice looks up at Empire with her mouth open and her left arm, farther from us, raised. Coins spill out on the square base, which is just big enough for Empire’s planted foot, the purse, and Avarice’s unstable feet.
Adriaen de Vries, Empire Triumphant over Avarice, 1610, bronze, Widener Collection, 1942.9.148

Empire Triumphant over Avarice

Adriaen de Vries · 1610 · bronze ·  Accession ID  1942.9.148

A clean-shaven, pale-skinned man with gray, powdered hair stands in the middle of a grassy landscape in this vertical portrait painting. He has smooth skin with hazel eyes under thick brows, a long nose, and his full, pale pink lips are closed. He stands facing us with his ankles crossed and his head turned slightly to look off to our right. A knee-length, ginger-brown jacket has a row of gold-colored buttons, the size of checkers pieces, down the front and lacy cuffs at the end of a row of three more buttons on each sleeve. One button is fastened across his chest over a white cravat and goldenrod-yellow vest patterned with tiny brown specks. His left hand, on our right, hangs down, holding a navy-blue tricorn hat next to navy breeches. White stockings cover his lower legs, and his black shoes have gleaming brass buckles. He leans his right hand, to our left, on the head of a wood walking stick, which is propped against that hip. The landscape around him is carpeted in shades of muted green with touches of golden yellow. White and dark pink flowers grow in clusters around his feet, and a grove of slender trees climbs a low hill on our right. Blue-green trees and vegetation stretch into the distance to meet a light blue body of water along the left edge of the painting. Low on the horizon, which comes about a fifth of the way up the composition, a mountain is hazy blue in the deep distance. Patches of vivid blue sky peek through swirling white, gray, and pale peach clouds that fill most of the background.
Sir Joshua Reynolds, John Musters, 1777-c. 1780, oil on canvas, Given in memory of Governor Alvan T. Fuller by The Fuller Foundation, Inc., 1961.2.2

John Musters

Sir Joshua Reynolds · 1777-c. 1780 · oil on canvas ·  Accession ID  1961.2.2