Artist:
N.C. Wyeth
(American, 1882 - 1945)
So through the Plymouth Woods John Alden went on his errand
Alternate Title(s):John Alden
Medium: Oil on canvas
Date: 1920
Dimensions:
40 × 30 in. (101.6 × 76.2 cm)
Private collection, UT
Copyright, 1920, Houghton Mifflin Company
Accession number: SUPP2000.1129
Research Number: NCW: 1129
InscribedLower left: N. C. WYETH (underlined)
Provenance(?); acquired by private collector, ca. 1978, and descended in family
Exhibition HistoryPhiladelphia, PA, 1921, as "John Alden"
References
Douglas Allen and Douglas Allen, Jr., N. C. Wyeth, The Collected Paintings, Illustrations and Murals (New York: Crown Publishers, Inc., 1972), p. 211; Christine B. Podmaniczky, N. C. Wyeth, A Catalogue Raisonné of Paintings (London: Scala, 2008), I.799, p. 399
Curatorial RemarksThe Brandywine River Museum of Art owns the copy of Houghton Mifflin's 1913 edition of The Courtship of Miles Standish, Elizabeth and other Poems by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (NCWS.95.211) which NCW read and marked as he chose his illustrative program. The copy is illustrated with engravings after an unidentified artist which seem to have furnished Wyeth with some inspiration.
"..."The Heart of the Puritan" compiled by Miss Hanscom of Smith College is a valuable collection of letters and journals which will add greatly to my mental background in working up the Miles Standish pictures." (NCW to "Babe," Jan. 14, 1920, WFA)
In his introduction to the edition, the poet's son (and painter) Ernest W. Longfellow wrote, "Mr. Wyeth's illustrations seem to me--and I doubt not that they would have seemed to my father--admirable all through in their richness of color and their unconventional treatment, coupled with their many evidences of the closest study of the period."
"..."The Heart of the Puritan" compiled by Miss Hanscom of Smith College is a valuable collection of letters and journals which will add greatly to my mental background in working up the Miles Standish pictures." (NCW to "Babe," Jan. 14, 1920, WFA)
In his introduction to the edition, the poet's son (and painter) Ernest W. Longfellow wrote, "Mr. Wyeth's illustrations seem to me--and I doubt not that they would have seemed to my father--admirable all through in their richness of color and their unconventional treatment, coupled with their many evidences of the closest study of the period."
Image Source for printed Catalogue Raisonne:digital photography from printed source (Brandywine River Museum Library, tear sheet)
Photo Credit:web: scan by BRM staff; hardcover: Rick Echelmeyer