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Exhibition History“Artist and Visionary: William Matthew Prior Revealed,” American Folk Art Museum, New York, NY, January 24, 2013 – May 27, 2013; Fenimore House Museum, May 26, 2012 – December 31, 2012.
BibliographyNina Fletcher Little, “William Matthew Prior,” Primitive Painters in America, 1750-1950, eds. Jean Lipman and Alice Winchester (New York: Dodd Head & Co., 1980), pp. 80-89.
Paul S. D’Ambrosio and Charlotte M. Emans, Folk Art’s Many Faces: Portraits in the New York State Historical Association (Cooperstown, NY: Fenimore Art Museum, 1987), pp.133-14.
Jacquelyn Oak and Gwendolyn DuBois Shaw, Artist and Visionary: William Matthew Prior (exh. cat. New York: Fenimore Art Museum, 2012).
Artist
William Matthew Prior
(1806 - 1873)
The Artist as a Young Man: Self Portrait
Date1825
MediumOil on canvas
DimensionsSight: 31 1/8 × 26 15/16 in. (79.1 × 68.4 cm)
Object numberN0008.2010
Credit LineCollection of the Fenimore Art Museum. Museum purchase with funds provided in part by Dr. Nancy Kollisch and Dr. Jeffrey Pressman
Photograph by Richard Walker
Label Text
By October 1825, when Prior painted his self-portrait, he was 19 years old and had been in Portland, Maine for about one year. He had become acquainted with ornamental painter Charles Codman (ca. 1800-1842) and the Almery Hamblin family who had been in the decorative painting trades for decades. A convincing likeness, his self-portrait is a well-developed composition, showing a fully rounded figure, subtle shading, and overall highlights. Like many other folk and academic painters, who produced self-portraits to display their abilities, the artist has included a paintbrush and palette. Prior painted at least one other portrait of himself in 1848. In the later portrait, his face is instantly recognizable– albeit older and bearded–when compared to the likeness of 1825.
Exhibition History“Artist and Visionary: William Matthew Prior Revealed,” American Folk Art Museum, New York, NY, January 24, 2013 – May 27, 2013; Fenimore House Museum, May 26, 2012 – December 31, 2012.
BibliographyNina Fletcher Little, “William Matthew Prior,” Primitive Painters in America, 1750-1950, eds. Jean Lipman and Alice Winchester (New York: Dodd Head & Co., 1980), pp. 80-89.
Paul S. D’Ambrosio and Charlotte M. Emans, Folk Art’s Many Faces: Portraits in the New York State Historical Association (Cooperstown, NY: Fenimore Art Museum, 1987), pp.133-14.
Jacquelyn Oak and Gwendolyn DuBois Shaw, Artist and Visionary: William Matthew Prior (exh. cat. New York: Fenimore Art Museum, 2012).
On View
On view
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