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Lot Essay
An exceptional survival of one of Gilbert Stuart’s renowned “Athenaeum” portraits, this portrayal of Washington is distinguished by the inclusion of a gilded armchair with red upholstery. Painted from life in Philadelphia in 1796, the original unfinished portrait was retained by Stuart, used as the basis for a number of replicas of which approximately 85 are known today and in 1831, acquired by the Boston Athenaeum. The likeness offered here displays the hallmarks of Stuart’s work during his later years in Boston from 1805 until his death in 1828. Here, the head is more round, the features softly delineated, the queue smaller and the shirt ruffle less intricate than those from Stuart’s years in Philadelphia and Washington. Stuart used wooden panels throughout his career but they are seen with greater frequency on portraits executed during his Boston years. As noted by Dr. Ellen Miles, “his favorite prepared panels [were] North Carolina yellow pine or West Indian mahogany texturized by dragging a toothed plane-iron diagonally over the wood.” The effect simulated the diagonal weave of a twill canvas, another of Stuart’s preferred materials. Other “Athenaeum” type portraits closely related to that offered here include four now in the collections of the Huntington Library, Art Collections, and Botanical Gardens, The National Gallery of Art, the National Trust for Historic Preservation, Kykuit and a private collection; the first can be dated to 1819 while the three others have been ascribed to circa 1820-1821 (Ellen G. Miles, catalogue entry and “Stuart in Boston,” Gilbert Stuart (New York, 2004), pp. 162, 289, figs. 102-104; Lance Mayer and Gay Myers, American Painters on Technique: The Colonial Period to 1860 (Getty Publications, 2011), p. 47; Christie’s, New York, 21 January 2022, lot 344).
While a few “Athenaeum” type portraits feature columns in the background, the vast majority lack any detailing beyond the sitter’s head and upper body. No other “Athenaeum” type portrait has been found that includes the sitter’s hand and a chair, but several of Stuart’s Boston portraits of other sitters appear to feature the same form, indicating that it was perhaps a prop in the artist’s studio. These include those of John Collins Warren (1812), Col. Israel Thorndike (c.1820), President James Monroe (c.1821), Bishop Cheverus and Josiah Quincy (1824-1825). Particularly evident in the portraits of Warren and Thorndike are sketchily rendered pink brushstrokes to convey the irregular stuffing of the padding on the arm; similar brushstrokes are seen on the portrait offered here (Ellen G. Miles and Carrie Rebora Barratt, catalogue entries, Gilbert Stuart, op. cit., pp. 301-304, 313-315, 319-321, 325-327, cats. 83, 87, 89, 91).
Given this portrait’s presumed ownership by Col. Israel Thorndike (1755-1832), it is significant that in addition to the inclusion of the same chair, this portrait and Stuart’s of Thorndike feature sitters in identical poses. Both men sit at a three-quarters angle facing their right with their left arm bent and the fingers on the left hand curled with the thumb resting on top. In the portrait of Thorndike, this hand is holding a letter and perhaps that was the intention here too. Furthermore, both works are on panels and their dimensions within an inch of each other. Given these close parallels, it is possible that Thorndike commissioned the portraits around the same time and wished to associate himself with the first President (for Stuart’s portrait of Thorndike, see Harvard Art Museums, acc. no. H643). His reverence for Washington is evident in his deep involvement the Washington Memorial Association. Serving in various capacities including president, Thorndike was instrumental in the group’s successful efforts to commission and install a statue of Washington for the Massachusetts State House. After the Association disbanded in 1827, the remaining funds were given to purchase the original “Athenaeum” type portraits of George and Martha Washington, which were given to the Boston Athenaeum in 1831 (Ilene D. Lieberman, “Sir Francis Chantrey's Monument to George Washington: Sculpture and Patronage in Post-Revolutionary America,” The Art Bulletin, vol. 71, no. 9 (June 1989), pp. 254-268).
Born in Beverly, Massachusetts, Thorndike was a privateer during the American Revolution and successfully thwarted the efforts of the British Navy. After the War, he established a highly lucrative mercantile business dealing chiefly with trade with the Far East. An ardent Federalist, he was a member in favor of ratification of the Constitution at the 1788 Massachusetts Convention and was later elected to the Massachusetts Legislature. His wealth grew as he further invested in manufacturing and real estate. In the early 1820s, he purchased numerous lots on Beacon Hill and re-sold them at great profit. Upon his death in 1832, Thorndike had acquired an immense fortune estimated at $1.8 million and he has been listed as the fiftieth richest American of all time. His extensive will lists multiple properties in Boston, including his own house on Summer Street, a brick house in Beverly, Massachusetts, which still stands as the town’s City Hall, a summer mansion house in Maine, lands in Ohio and an estate in Cuba. Few individual items are included, but in his first codicil, he specifies that his wife, Sarah, shall have “use possession and income of all the pictures in my new dining room which has been added to the house which I now occupy in said Boston…” Thorndike is known to have hosted lively dinner parties and this portrait offered here may have been a witness to these gatherings, such as the 1825 celebration of the 50th anniversary of Bunker Hill attended by the Marquis de Lafayette (Josiah Quincy, The History of Harvard University, vol. II (Cambridge, Massachusetts, 1840), pp. 411-413, 596-597; Michael Klepper and Robert Gunther, The Wealthy 100: From Benjamin Franklin to Bill Gates—A Ranking of the Richest Americans, Past and Present (1996), pp. xii, 186-187; Allen Chamberlain, Beacon Hill: Its Ancient Pastures and Early Mansions (Boston, 1925), pp. 130, 149-150, 189; ancestry.com, Massachusetts, U.S., Wills and Probate Records, 1635-1991, vol 130, 1832-1833 [database on-line], accessed 10 December 2022; at an earlier dinner party at Thorndike’s home in 1812 with Governor Elbridge Gerry in attendance, artist Elkanah Tisdale drew wings on an Essex County election district map that due to political expediency happened to be in the shape of a salamander, an act that yielded the term “gerrymandering,” see Samuel Adams Drake, Historic Fields and Mansions of Middlesex (Boston, 1874), p. 321).
After Thorndike’s death, the portrait appears to have been inherited by his son, Charles (1795-1833), who outlived his father by less than a year and the C. Thorndike inscription on the reverse most likely refers to his brief ownership. Through his widow, the work passed to their daughter, Mary Adeline Thorndike (1825-1899) who in 1851 married Miguel de los Santos Bañuelos y Traval, later Count of Bañuelos (1821-1906), a secretary of legation at the Spanish embassy in Washington D.C. Soon after, he was appointed to a diplomatic post in Rome and the family moved to Italy and after living in various locales in Spain, settled in Biarritz, France. The portrait then descended through three generations of Spanish nobility and the last family owner was Mary Adeline’s great-granddaughter Micaëla Cousiño (Micaëla Ana María Cousiño y Quiñones de León), Countess of Paris (1938–2022).
While a few “Athenaeum” type portraits feature columns in the background, the vast majority lack any detailing beyond the sitter’s head and upper body. No other “Athenaeum” type portrait has been found that includes the sitter’s hand and a chair, but several of Stuart’s Boston portraits of other sitters appear to feature the same form, indicating that it was perhaps a prop in the artist’s studio. These include those of John Collins Warren (1812), Col. Israel Thorndike (c.1820), President James Monroe (c.1821), Bishop Cheverus and Josiah Quincy (1824-1825). Particularly evident in the portraits of Warren and Thorndike are sketchily rendered pink brushstrokes to convey the irregular stuffing of the padding on the arm; similar brushstrokes are seen on the portrait offered here (Ellen G. Miles and Carrie Rebora Barratt, catalogue entries, Gilbert Stuart, op. cit., pp. 301-304, 313-315, 319-321, 325-327, cats. 83, 87, 89, 91).
Given this portrait’s presumed ownership by Col. Israel Thorndike (1755-1832), it is significant that in addition to the inclusion of the same chair, this portrait and Stuart’s of Thorndike feature sitters in identical poses. Both men sit at a three-quarters angle facing their right with their left arm bent and the fingers on the left hand curled with the thumb resting on top. In the portrait of Thorndike, this hand is holding a letter and perhaps that was the intention here too. Furthermore, both works are on panels and their dimensions within an inch of each other. Given these close parallels, it is possible that Thorndike commissioned the portraits around the same time and wished to associate himself with the first President (for Stuart’s portrait of Thorndike, see Harvard Art Museums, acc. no. H643). His reverence for Washington is evident in his deep involvement the Washington Memorial Association. Serving in various capacities including president, Thorndike was instrumental in the group’s successful efforts to commission and install a statue of Washington for the Massachusetts State House. After the Association disbanded in 1827, the remaining funds were given to purchase the original “Athenaeum” type portraits of George and Martha Washington, which were given to the Boston Athenaeum in 1831 (Ilene D. Lieberman, “Sir Francis Chantrey's Monument to George Washington: Sculpture and Patronage in Post-Revolutionary America,” The Art Bulletin, vol. 71, no. 9 (June 1989), pp. 254-268).
Born in Beverly, Massachusetts, Thorndike was a privateer during the American Revolution and successfully thwarted the efforts of the British Navy. After the War, he established a highly lucrative mercantile business dealing chiefly with trade with the Far East. An ardent Federalist, he was a member in favor of ratification of the Constitution at the 1788 Massachusetts Convention and was later elected to the Massachusetts Legislature. His wealth grew as he further invested in manufacturing and real estate. In the early 1820s, he purchased numerous lots on Beacon Hill and re-sold them at great profit. Upon his death in 1832, Thorndike had acquired an immense fortune estimated at $1.8 million and he has been listed as the fiftieth richest American of all time. His extensive will lists multiple properties in Boston, including his own house on Summer Street, a brick house in Beverly, Massachusetts, which still stands as the town’s City Hall, a summer mansion house in Maine, lands in Ohio and an estate in Cuba. Few individual items are included, but in his first codicil, he specifies that his wife, Sarah, shall have “use possession and income of all the pictures in my new dining room which has been added to the house which I now occupy in said Boston…” Thorndike is known to have hosted lively dinner parties and this portrait offered here may have been a witness to these gatherings, such as the 1825 celebration of the 50th anniversary of Bunker Hill attended by the Marquis de Lafayette (Josiah Quincy, The History of Harvard University, vol. II (Cambridge, Massachusetts, 1840), pp. 411-413, 596-597; Michael Klepper and Robert Gunther, The Wealthy 100: From Benjamin Franklin to Bill Gates—A Ranking of the Richest Americans, Past and Present (1996), pp. xii, 186-187; Allen Chamberlain, Beacon Hill: Its Ancient Pastures and Early Mansions (Boston, 1925), pp. 130, 149-150, 189; ancestry.com, Massachusetts, U.S., Wills and Probate Records, 1635-1991, vol 130, 1832-1833 [database on-line], accessed 10 December 2022; at an earlier dinner party at Thorndike’s home in 1812 with Governor Elbridge Gerry in attendance, artist Elkanah Tisdale drew wings on an Essex County election district map that due to political expediency happened to be in the shape of a salamander, an act that yielded the term “gerrymandering,” see Samuel Adams Drake, Historic Fields and Mansions of Middlesex (Boston, 1874), p. 321).
After Thorndike’s death, the portrait appears to have been inherited by his son, Charles (1795-1833), who outlived his father by less than a year and the C. Thorndike inscription on the reverse most likely refers to his brief ownership. Through his widow, the work passed to their daughter, Mary Adeline Thorndike (1825-1899) who in 1851 married Miguel de los Santos Bañuelos y Traval, later Count of Bañuelos (1821-1906), a secretary of legation at the Spanish embassy in Washington D.C. Soon after, he was appointed to a diplomatic post in Rome and the family moved to Italy and after living in various locales in Spain, settled in Biarritz, France. The portrait then descended through three generations of Spanish nobility and the last family owner was Mary Adeline’s great-granddaughter Micaëla Cousiño (Micaëla Ana María Cousiño y Quiñones de León), Countess of Paris (1938–2022).