Artist:
N.C. Wyeth
(American, 1882 - 1945)
The First Maine Fisherman
Medium: Oil on hardboard (Renaissance Panel)
Date: 1937
Dimensions:
35 × 25 in. (88.9 × 63.5 cm)
Collection of Joel and Suzanne Sugg
Accession number: SUPP2000.698
Research Number: NCW: 698
InscribedLower left: N. C. Wyeth; label on reverse: Renaissance Panel No. 516, prepared 2/23/37; inscribed on label in NCW's hand: Penobscot Indian shooting pollack on Monhegan Is.; also on label in different hand: To my darling Carr(??) G.B.M. Laguna Beach, Calif. Oct. 27, 1942; painted onto reverse of panel: APPLY NO VARNISH, VASELINE / OR OTHER PREPARATIONS / TO THIS PAINTING ON GESSO. / N. C. WYETH
ProvenanceN. C. Wyeth; George B.Mahan, Laguna Beach, CA, 1942, and descended in family; (Brandywine Fantasy Gallery, Chicago, IL)
Exhibition HistoryPortland, ME, 1938; San Angelo, TX, 1993
References
"The Romance That Is Maine's," The Boston Herald, June 19, 1938, Rotogravure Section, unpaginated; Marge Cook, "Artist N. C. Wyeth," Down East Magazine (April 1964), illus. in color between ps. 34-35; Douglas Allen and Douglas Allen, Jr., N. C. Wyeth, The Collected Paintings, Illustrations and Murals (New York: Crown Publishers, 1972), ps. 216, 281; Christine B. Podmaniczky, N. C. Wyeth, A Catalogue Raisonné of Paintings (London: Scala, 2008), I.1222, p. 554
Curatorial RemarksFrom October, 1935, when Wyeth began to talk seriously with editors at Little, Brown about the publication of this book, this subject appeared in all lists of potential illustrations (NCW to Roger Scaife, Oct. 10, 1935 and NCW to A. R. McIntyre, March 23, 1936, both Kenneth Roberts papers, Dartmouth College Library). In a letter of June 1937, the artist wrote, "I've just finished the first painting for the Maine book (Indians shooting fish from the rocks) and it has come out very effectively. It has got a surprising amount of Maine coast feeling in it. Perhaps my intense yearning helped me" (NCW to Carolyn Bockius Wyeth in Port Clyde, June 9, 1937, Wyeth Family Archives). The Brandywine River Musuem holds a lantern slide of the composition drawing for this painting (NCWS.95.1825.134). George B. Mahan was a personal friend of the artist.
Image Source for printed Catalogue Raisonne:Transparency directly from painting
Photo Credit:Ashley Slade, 11/2002