Artist:
N.C. Wyeth
(American, 1882 - 1945)
Kidnapped, cover illustration
Alternate Title(s):Book Cover for Kidnapped; The Fugitives
Medium: Oil on canvas
Date: 1913
Dimensions:
42 1/8 × 30 in. (107 × 76.2 cm)
Brandywine River Museum of Art, Purchased through the generosity of Mrs. J. Maxwell Moran and Anson M. Beard, Jr., 1996
Accession number: 96.4
Label Copy:
Wyeth first painted the title block to look like a scroll with hand-painted lettering, according to a color proof found in the N. C. Wyeth Studio Collection. It’s not clear whether the artist or a staff artist at Scribner’s changed the shape of the box; a type-set title was added during the press run.
Research Number: NCW: 1243
InscribedLower right: N. C. WYETH / 1913 (underlined) / and signed again, faintly, below; lower left, faintly: N. C. WYETH (underlined); © CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS; on reverse, written on canvas: 8820-a; written on excess tacking edge across top stretcher bar: about chap. XXII-The Flight in the Heather ?; also written across excess tacking edge: 4663 4500A; attached to top stretcher bar, label of the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts & the Phila. Watercolor Club for the Twelfth Annual Watercolor Exhibition, 1914, Title: [in N. C. Wyeth's hand] Book Cover for Kidnapped, Artist: N. C. Wyeth, Return Address: Chadds Ford, Pa.; [note that canvas shows evidence of two labels previously adhered to reverse, one measured 3 5/8 x 4 1/4 (probably a Scribner's label), the other measured 8 1/4 x 5 ½]
ProvenanceCharles Scribner's Sons, New York, NY; Jes Schlaikjer (N.A., and illustrator for Scribner's); descended in family
Exhibition HistoryPhiladelphia, PA, 1914, no. 1041, as "Book Cover for Kidnapped"; Brooklyn, NY, 1920, no. 14, as "The Fugitives"; Akron, OH, Akron Museum of Art, June 15 - Sept. 1, 2002, and Lawrence, KS, Spencer Museum of Art, Sept. 21 - Nov. 17, 2002, "N. C. Wyeth from the Brandywine River Museum Collection"; Chadds Ford, PA, 2005; Rockland, Maine, Farnsworth Art Museum, "Every Picture Tells a Story," April 27-Dec. 30, 2013;
References
Betsy James Wyeth, ed., The Wyeths The Letters of N. C. Wyeth, 1901-1945 (Boston: Gambit, 1971), p. 442; Douglas Allen and Douglas Allen, Jr., N. C. Wyeth, The Collected Paintings, Illustrations and Murals (New York: Crown Publishers, Inc., 1972), p. 218; David Michaelis, N. C. Wyeth A Biography (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1998), color illustration after p. 148; Christine B. Podmaniczky, N. C. Wyeth, A Catalogue Raisonné of Paintings (London: Scala, 2008), I.462, p. 268-269
Curatorial RemarksIn a letter to his mother dated Sept. 1, 1913, Wyeth recorded Theodore Roosevelt's reaction to this painting (Betsy James Wyeth, ed., p. 442). Roosevelt found the painting lacking in detail, and when Wyeth pled consistancy with Stevenson's text, Roosevelt replied that it was the illustrator's duty to "strengthen" the author.
The artist's original concept of this cover design included the title in yellow letters, set into a scroll above the figures' heads. Publication of this design proceeded to at least one set of proofs. (Brandywine River Museum library). For unknown reasons, the type style and scroll were changed, most likely before the first edition was printed. Pentimenti suggest and X-radiographs confirm that the scroll and its lettering are below the gray box, but it is not certain whether the artist himself made the changes.
Notes and insertions found in Wyeth's copy of "Bonnie Scotland Painted by Sutton Palmer" by A. R. Hope Moncrieff (A. & C. Black, 1912), suggest that the artist used this book (NCWS.95.608) as a visual resource for the Kidnapped paintings.
The artist's original concept of this cover design included the title in yellow letters, set into a scroll above the figures' heads. Publication of this design proceeded to at least one set of proofs. (Brandywine River Museum library). For unknown reasons, the type style and scroll were changed, most likely before the first edition was printed. Pentimenti suggest and X-radiographs confirm that the scroll and its lettering are below the gray box, but it is not certain whether the artist himself made the changes.
Notes and insertions found in Wyeth's copy of "Bonnie Scotland Painted by Sutton Palmer" by A. R. Hope Moncrieff (A. & C. Black, 1912), suggest that the artist used this book (NCWS.95.608) as a visual resource for the Kidnapped paintings.
Image Source for printed Catalogue Raisonne:1. Transparency directly from painting; 2. Early color proof found in the artist's studio, showing original appearance of painting (BRM library)
Photo Credit:1. Rick Echelmeyer, 1997; 2. BRM staff