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Lady with a Lute
Thomas Dewing1886
National Gallery of Art, Washington DC
Washington, DC, United States
Information on this painting can be found in the Gallery publication_ American Paintings of the Nineteenth Century, Part _I, pages 127-130, which is available as a free PDF at <u>https://www.nga.gov/content/dam/ngaweb/research/publications/pdfs/american-paintings-19th-century-part-1.pdf</u>
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Details
- Title: Lady with a Lute
- Creator: Thomas Wilmer Dewing
- Date Created: 1886
- Physical Dimensions: overall: 50.8 x 40 cm (20 x 15 3/4 in.) framed: 88.3 x 77.2 x 9.5 cm (34 3/4 x 30 3/8 x 3 3/4 in.)
- Provenance: Purchased 1889 from the artist by Smith College Museum of Art, Northampton, Massachusetts;[1] (sale, Gimbel Brothers, New York, 1946). Dr. and Mrs. Walter Timme, Cold Spring, New York, by May 1947;[2] bequest 1978 to NGA. [1] Letter from Linda Muehlig, curator at Smith College, dated 4 May 1983 (in NGA curatorial files), states that the painting was bought directly from the artist in 1889. While in the Smith College collection the painting was titled _A Lute Player_. [2] According to a letter of 30 August 1978 from Susan Hobbs (in NGA curatorial files), Mrs. Timme acquired the painting at the Gimbel Brothers auction; however, in a letter of 16 May 1947 to Frederick Hartt, acting director of the Smith College Art Museum (Smith College Art Museum archives; photocopy in NGA curatorial files), Dr. Timme states that he had "paid nearly three times what Gimbel's had sold it for," which clearly implies there was an intermediary owner. Timme also observed: "The `Lute Player'. . . was thought by many people to be [Dewing's] masterpiece. I have known a number of people both painters and connoisseurs who made a pilgrimage to Northampton just to see that picture. To some people your gallery was known by this picture, if by none other. . . . Some weeks ago a friend of mine, connected with the National (Mellon) Gallery in Washington, came to my home, saw it and asked for the donation of it as an outstanding example of Dewing." Further clarification, not published in the NGA systematic catalogue entry, is provided in a letter of 5 July 1998 from Susan Hobbs (in NGA curatorial files). She relates that in 1983 she went over the sequence of events with Nelson White (Thayer's biographer and friend of Dr. Timme's). Her notes on the conversation indicate that Gimbels & Co. sold the painting to Milch Gallery, who in turn sold it to Dr. Timme. Nelson White got Dr. Timme to give him right of first refusal if he ever wanted to sell it. (See also _Masterworks of American Painting and Sculpture from the Smith College Museum of Art_, Ed. Linda Muehlig, New York, 1999:10-11, 245 n. 8.)
- Rights: CC0
- Medium: oil on wood
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