Untitled (Hudson River Landscape with Indian)
Artist
De Witt Clinton Boutelle
(American, 1820-1884)
CultureAmerican
Date1848
MediumOil on canvas
Dimensions40 x 55 1/8 in. (101.6 x 140 cm)
Overall, Frame: 43 5/8 × 58 5/8 × 2 1/2 in. (110.8 × 148.9 × 6.4 cm)
Overall, Frame: 43 5/8 × 58 5/8 × 2 1/2 in. (110.8 × 148.9 × 6.4 cm)
InscribedSigned and dated lower right: Boutelle 1848
Credit LineGift of Walter P. Chrysler, Jr.
Object number71.729
Not on view
DescriptionThis is an oil on canvas painting of a landscape. The horizon line divides the canvas in half; a triangle protrudes into the space from the right, formed by a treed cliff. The sky is pale with low clouds, giving distance. The left side of the canvas is pulled into the distance as the land recedes to a valley with a lake. Several sailboats are on the water below. Bare trees twist in the foreground, on the left. On a rock, to the right off-center of the canvas, a solitary figure on a cliff stands: an Indian with a long red cape and full headdress faces the valley with his hand on his heart.Label TextDe Witt Clinton Boutelle American (1820-1884) Untitled (Hudson River Landscape with Indian), 1848 Oil on canvas, 40 x 55 1/8 in. Chrysler Museum of Art, Norfolk, VA Gift of Walter P. Chrysler, Jr. 71.729ProvenanceChrysler Art Museum of Provincetown, Mass., 1969; gift of Walter P. Chrysler, Jr., to the Chrysler Museum, Norfolk, 1971. Exhibition HistoryThis painting was probably exhibited at the National Academy, 1846, no. 285. "Three Hundred Years of American Art in the Chrysler Museum," Chrysler Museum at Norfolk, Va., March 1 - July 4, 1976. "1846: A 150th Year Anniversary," The Portsmouth Museums Community Arts Center, Portsmouth, Va., September 28 - November 24, 1996. “La peinture américaine: 1830—1900,” Fondation de l’Hermitage, Lausanne, Switzerland, June 27 – October 26, 2014.Published ReferencesDennis R. Anderson, _Three Hundred Years of American Art in the Chrysler Museum_, exh. cat., Norfolk, Va., 1975, 100. Albert Boime, _The Magisterial Gaze: Manifest Destiny and American Landscape Painting c. 1830-1865_ (Washington, DC: Smithsonian Institution Press, 1991), 79, 80. ISBN: 1560980958 Angela Miller, _The Empire of the Eye: Landscape Representation and American Cultural Politics, 1825-1875_ (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1993), 60, no. 58. ISBN: 0801428300 Martha N. Hagood and Jefferson C. Harrison, _American Art at the Chrysler Museum: Selected Paintings, Sculpture, and Drawings_ (Norfolk, Va.: Chrysler Museum of Art, 2005), 58, no. 29. William Hauptman, _Peindre L'Amerique: Les artistes du Nouveau Monde, 1830-1900_ (Lausanne, Switzerland: Fondation de l'Hermitage and La Bibliotèque des Arts, 2014) 55, cat. 13. Kimberly A. Orcutt, _The American Art-Union: Utopia and SKepticism in the Antebellum Era_(New York, NY: Fordham University Press, 2024), 75.
