Teaching Art History with Treefrog Treasures (2 Viewers)

[7th OVI]

I had the opportunity to see some of John Brown's bible that he carried when it surfaced from a private collection a few years ago. Very chilling on what he underlined, took out of context and how some pages were worn thin from constant leafing and reading. He had it through a number of his acts in Kansas. It definitely would be bring into question his sanity at the time. Chris

 

[Brother Jonathan]

Just by way of an FYI:

Many of the Sharps that went to Kansas and to the Harpers Ferry raiders were an early carbine model:
http://www.nramuseum.com/guns/the-g...union-carbines/john-brown-sharps-carbine.aspx

Apparently, John Brown personally carried this sporting model of the Sharps in Kansas:
http://amhistory.si.edu/militaryhistory/collection/object.asp?ID=636

Also, a Berdan model of Sharps rifle would have double set triggers. The rifle pictured is a standard infantry model of the 1859 Sharps rifle.

Keep up the great work!

 

[Poppo]

Garibaldi on horse in Genova,I took the photo a few days ago....

 

[PolarBear]

Just by way of an FYI:

Many of the Sharps that went to Kansas and to the Harpers Ferry raiders were an early carbine model:
http://www.nramuseum.com/guns/the-g...union-carbines/john-brown-sharps-carbine.aspx

Apparently, John Brown personally carried this sporting model of the Sharps in Kansas:
http://amhistory.si.edu/militaryhistory/collection/object.asp?ID=636

Also, a Berdan model of Sharps rifle would have double set triggers. The rifle pictured is a standard infantry model of the 1859 Sharps rifle.

Keep up the great work!

Thank you so much for your expertise. Glad you are enjoying the thread
Here are the two models you refer to

 

[PolarBear]

Part 18A Hiram Powers Sculpture The Greek Slave & The Greek War of Independence

In my recent posts I have referred to Panhellenism and the Greek Revival in the United States in the decades prior to the outbreak of the Civil War as a response to the Greek War of Independence or Greek Revolution. In the next two posts I will examine a major work of 19th C American sculpturein that context. Historically, America felt a strong affinity to Greece which a created a Democracy in ancient times and in the 1800s had to fight for their own independence.

Among the many American artists who went to Italy to study and work in the 19th Century were numerous sculptors who worked in either Rome or Florence. Both male and female sculptors were represented. Italy was the ideal place for them to go because here was an important source of marble and collections of Ancient Greek and Roman statues as well as examples from the Renaissance (15-16th Centuries) and Baroque (17th Centuries) eras.

I will begin my examination of American sculpture done in 19th C Italy with a two part examination of Hiram Powers (1805-1873) The Greek Slave of 1843. I have divided it into two parts since the makeup and interpretation of the sculpture when displayed in public changed from the 1840s into the 1850s/60s. At first it was presented and viewed for its relevance for the Greek War of Independence and subsequently for its connections to slavery and abolition in America. Thus two historical events were associated with a single work of art. Both events were revolutions: the Greeks revolting against the oppression of the Ottoman Turks and American Southern planters rebelling against the Industrial North over the issue of slavery.

The world of Garibaldi that we have been examining to provide an interpretation of the significance of the Woman in the Red Jacket in Homer's Old Mill of 1871 was characterized by revolutionary struggles around the world. These revolutions were a legacy of those that occurred in America, France, and Haiti in the late 18th Century and reached a fever pitch during the Nationalist Revolutions of 1848 in Europe.

Hiram Powers was born in Woodstock, Vermont but came of age in Cincinnati, Ohio. In the latter half of the 1820s, he became interested in sculpture and began experimenting with wax and clay as an avocation while working as a mechanic. By the 1830s he was making portrait busts of famous Americans such as Andrew Jackson and became quite successful in Washington sculpting other American politicians. In 1837, he decided to go to Italy to further his skills and opportunities as a sculptor. He settled in Florence where he would create his most famous work: The Greek Slave.

The Greek Slave would become one of the most famous and popular works of American art during the 19th Century. In Italy Powers was inspired to go beyond his earlier portrait commissions and create more sophisticated,
ideal and profitable subjects drawn from history, literature, and mythology.
The Greek Slave should be viewed as a Transatlantic artwork, connecting Greece and America through their wars for independence and the question of slavery and freedom.

After arriving in Italy in 1837, Powers had the opportunity to see Greek and Roman sculpture first hand. Among the masterpieces he admired was the Medici Venus, a Hellenistic (1st Century BCE) marble copy of a Greek bronze. This was the work that served as the major source and inspiration for Powers' Greek Slave, especially in his choice of the figure's pose.

Powers began his sculpture in 1843, casting the original in plaster. This would serve as the source for 6 marble versions which were sold to collectors in America and Europe. They sold for $4000 each. The first marble version appeared in 1846. Powers model for the plaster original was the 18 year old daughter of his wife's dressmaker.

Illustrations:

1.Hiram Powers in his Studio with Bust version of the Greek Slave
The Medici Venus 1st Century BC

2.Powers The Greek Slave 1840s-50s
Detail of The Greek Slave showing Cross and Locket
The Greek Slave at the Düsseldorf Gallery NYC 1858

Continued on next screen

 

[PolarBear]

Part 18A Continued Hiram Powers Sculpture The Greek Slave & The Greek War of Independence

The Greek Slave became the most famous American sculpture of its time.
Many American visitors came to his studio in Florence to see it. Powers was a shrewd Yankee entrepreneur who capitalized on the public's interest by taking the marble versions on a number of tours. It was the first American work of art to get such a major tour. The public tours included London (1845), the United States (1847), and the Great Exhibition at the Crystal Palace of 1851 in Hyde Park, London. The 1847 U.S. exhibition toured over a dozen cities and was seen by 100,000 people. When exhibited in New York it yielded $25,000 in entrance fees.
Powers used his skills as an entrepreneur to market bust length versions of the Greek Slave and statuette versions that could be displayed in Victorian parlors.

Powers also provided viewers with the narrative he wanted his viewers to take away from seeing the statue. He did this through booklets or brochures meant to serve as guide books. Basically he wanted his viewers to view the statue correctly:


These were the basic elements of the story as he saw it:

The girl's parents have been killed by the Turks
She has then been abducted from one of the Greek islands during the war
She is now to be sold into slavery
She stands on the auction block to be examined by potential buyers
These buyers are either Turks or Middle Eastern buyers

A significant aspect of the statue that Power felt necessary to explain was the young woman's nudity. This was essential for prudish Victorian audiences. By turning her head away from her captors, she is meant to show her disdain for them. By placing her arm across her pubic area she emphasizes her chastity. She stands next to a column that is draped with her clothing. Two objects set on the clothing carry additional symbols of her purity: a Christian cross as an emblem of her religious faith, and a locket with a picture of a fiancé or husband symbolizing devotion. Powers even enlisted clergymen such as the Reverend Orville Dewey an influential Boston and New York minister to contribute texts that emphasized the slave's resistance to her captors and her high moral purpose. Powers 1847 pamphlet for the American tour include press clippings, endorsements and even poems, including one by Elizabeth Barrett Browning.

Continued on Next Screen

 

[PolarBear]

Part 18A Continued Hiram Powers Sculpture The Greek Slave & The Greek War of Independence

What is missing from Powers' Greek Slave are her Turkish captors. An idea of what this would look like is provided by an 1866 painting by the French artist Jean-Leon Gerome entitled The Slave Market. In the painting the nude light-skinned slave is surrounded by darker-skinned Middle Eastern males who are shown inspecting her from head to toe including her teeth.
A similar situation occurs in a Daguerreotype hand tinted in color showing Powers Greek Slave accompanied by three turbaned men sitting on the floor in a situation similar to the Gerome painting. Again a contrast is made between the white and dark skins. It has been suggested by art historian Sarah Burns that the photograph is likely an example of 19th erotica similar to the notorious French postcards of the 19th and 20th centuries. One other comparison that can be made with Powers' Greek Slave is Delacroix's 1826 painting Greece Expiring on the Ruins of Missolonghi. Greece is represented by the white-skinned woman and her captors by the Egyptian Blackamoor standing in the background. Such contrasts take us into the realm of Orientalism.

Orientalism is further exemplified in the three examples shown in Illustration 4. Orientalism refers to how the West has viewed the East in its literature and art. The term was coined by the literary scholar Edward Said in his 1978 book on the subject. The concept really got underway with the invasion of Egypt by Napoleon in Egypt and Syria between 1798 and 1801. The material he brought back to Europe formed a foundation for the study of the Middle East. Said's book explains how this area of the world was viewed by Europeans and subsequently Americans. This was the Land of the Arabian Nights. Essentially Westerners viewed the Middle East through a lens of exoticism and eroticism mixed with stereotypes of non Western peoples. Many Westerners, however, were attracted to the world conjured up by the Orient. Therefore it was not unusual for Westerners to "go native" and adopt aspects of the Orient frequently by means of wearing native dress. Some of Napoleon's troops in Egypt wore Middle Eastern style clothing. Among well known American Orientalists was Bayard Taylor a travel writer and lecturer whose portrait was painted in 1855 by American artist Thomas Hicks who spent part of his career in Italy. In the same year Taylor published his book The Land of the Saracen. In Hicks' painting Taylor is seen wearing Middle Eastern costume. He is also shown with a hookah pipe and an Arabic sword. He has a servant wearing a red fez to look after him. The setting is one overlooking Damascus. Taylor was a good example of the charismatic Romantic adventurer. He had lots of female admirers and foreshadowed 1920s movie idol Rudolph Valentino who made his fame with The Sheik (1921) whose character provided brides for wealthy Arabs. This was also the world of the Harem as seen in Delacroix's 1834 Women of Algiers in their Apartment. By the time the French painter executed this work, Algeria was already a French colony.

Orientalism became a means of escape and therapy for Westerners living in an increasingly industrialized and urban society. The darker side of the East-West divide was the "Clash of Civilizations" going back to the Crusades which was how the Greek War of Independence was framed pitting Greek Orthodox Christians against Turkish and Egyptian Muslims. Powers' Greek Slave should be seen as an example of that conflict.

Illustrations:

3.Jean-Leon Gerome The Slave Market 1866
Greek Slave with Captors hand-tinted daguerreotype 1847-51 Unknown photographer
Eugene Delacroix Greece on the Ruins of Missolonghi 1826

4.Bayard Taylor by Thomas Hicks (1855)
Orientalism a 1978 book by Edward Said
Women of Algiers in Their Apartment 1834 by Eugene Delacroix

5. Statuettes of Greek Slave in Victorian homes (below red dots)
Earthenware Pitcher Decorated with the Greek Slave 1853
Coverlet 1851

Next Time: Powers The Greek Slave and American Slavery and Abolition

 

[PolarBear]

Note: Part 18A Below is divided among 3 Screens
125, 126 and 127

 

[PolarBear]

Part 19A Powers Greek Slave and American Slavery At The Crystal Palace Exhibition London 1851

Introduction:

When Hiram Powers was sculpting The Greek Slave in his studio in Florence in the 1840s, the American capitalist economy was expanding through its participation in what Harvard historian Sven Beckert has called the Empire of Cotton. There were two components to this economic boom: the agricultural slave labor of the South that grew the cotton for their planter/masters and the industrial wage labor in the North that turned the raw cotton into thread and fabric. The cotton produced in the South was also shipped to England where it supplied the textile mills of Manchester and Lancashire. Although Britain had abolished slavery in 1833, in the decades prior to the outbreak of the Civil War, it was dependent on the labor of American slaves to supply raw cotton to its factories. It is therefore significant that when Powers Greek Slave was included among the American exhibit at the Great Exhibition of the Works of Industry of All Nations held in London's Crystal Palace in 1851, that the sculpture was given alternative interpretations.These will be discussed in an upcoming post.


The Crystal Palace and the Great Exhibition:

The Great Exhibition of 1851 was the first World's Fair of its kind. It was an important symbol of modernity. It was held at London's Hyde Park, in England where the Industrial Revolution had its beginnings. The Exhibition's purpose was to display the idea of progress especially in the areas of science, technology, manufacturing, and the arts. The latter was illustrated by the Crystal Palace itself. Designed by the English architect Joseph Paxton, it was constructed from cast iron and plate-glass, both products of industrial technology. The building measured 1,851 feet in length and its interior was 128 feet high. Exhibition space was over 900,000 square feet.The glass walls and ceiling eliminated the need for interior lighting. The world's 100,000 products sent to the exhibition represented over 15,000 exhibitors. Each nation wanted to show off examples of its representative and most advanced products. The building got its name from two factors: Crystal because of the use of glass and Palace because the exhibition was the idea of Prince Albert, the husband of Queen Victoria.

American Manufactures at the Crystal Palace:

Although America was a new nation compared to the European nations represented at the fair, it nevertheless was already industrializing and producing manufactured goods that would attain worldwide reputations. Three examples of American products displayed at the Crystal Palace are illustrated below: a Colt Revolver, a Bowie Knife, and the McCormick Reaper that revolutionized the collection of hay for the farmer. American innovators from the latter half of the 19th Century such as Thomas Edison and Alexander Graham Bell would produce a variety of products such as the light bulb , phonograph and telephone that would make major contributions at home and abroad. The items at the 1851 exhibition were a preview of these things to come.


The Greek Slave at the Crystal Palace:

Powers Greek Slave was the most prominent American sculpture at
the exhibition. It appeared on the front page of the August 8th,1851 issue of the widely read London Illustrated News helping to draw fair goers to the exhibition. As discussed in an earlier post, Britain's most famous Romantic poet, Lord Byron, had participated along with other British volunteers in coming to the aid of the Greeks besieged by the Ottoman Turks. As a result, the subject increased local interest in viewing the sculpture.

As may be seen in the attached illustration, the statue was set on a stage-like platform placed in its own “theatrical” setting of a red curtain. The monumentality of the sculpture was enhanced by a second pedestal. It was placed in front of a tableau of an Indian chief and his squaw. Related to the latter was a marble sculpture by Anglo-American artist Peter Stephenson entitled The Wounded or Dying Indian done between 1848 and 1850. Stephenson had been born in England but came of age in the United States. Like Powers he eventually moved to Italy. The Indian was created in his studio in Rome. This exotic American Indian subject would have appealed to a European audience. Stephenson created the work at a time when the Indian was viewed as an example of the Noble Savage. The theme of the Dying Indian foreshadowed the subject of the Vanishing Indian that was popularized by American artists and photographers at the end of the 19th Century.

Illustrations:

1.Exterior and Interior of the Crystal Palace London May 1 to October 1 1851
2.Colt Revolver 1851 Bowie Knife
3.McCormick Mechanical Reaper 1851
4.Powers Greek Slave at the Crystal Palace and on the Cover of the August 5, 1851 London Illustrated News
5. Wounded Indian 1848-50 by Peter Stephenson

To Be Continued: Next Time--New Ways of Looking at The Greek Slave

 

[REVWARBUFF]

Thanks for continuing to share this fascinating history with us Randy.

This was all once again quite interesting and it's good to see you adding to your thread as it's been a while.

Mark

 

[PolarBear]

Part 19B Powers Greek Slave and American Slavery: Anti-Slavery Responses to Powers' Greek Slave at the Crystal Palace:


In my previous posts on the Greek Slave, the sculpture was considered in the context of the Greek Revolution (1821-1832) against the Turks of the Ottoman Empire. However, at the Crystal Palace, the narrative became altered from the Turkish enslavement of Greeks to a critique of America's involvement in the African slave trade. The Anti-Slavery critique came from two sources: anti-slavery cartoons in the British press, and theatrical performances by American fugitive slaves and abolitionists at the Crystal Palace some of which were staged near Powers' sculpture.

British Political Cartoons on American Slavery:

I have included four examples of the cartoons that appeared in the British press that were critical of American slavery and challenged the presence of the Greek Slave and the absence of any reference to the United States's own involvement with the institution of the enslavement of African Americans. Ironically, the same Turks who captured the young Greek girl represented by Powers statue were also very active in the African slave trade.

The first cartoon "The Shadow of English Liberty in America" appeared in Punch, the British humor magazine, the year before the Great Exhibition. Since England had abolished slavery in 1833, this was meant as criticism of the United States for its continued involvement in the institution. A statue representing American Liberty complete with the symbolic Phrygian Liberty Cap stands in the center of the composition. To the right is the shadow of a black female slave in chains. The American colonists were proud of the liberty they had achieved in the American War of Independence. However, according to the cartoon, that liberty was not complete because the slaves had not yet been freed. The cartoon was meant to single out American hypocrisy on the question of freedom

The title of the second cartoon "The Virginian Slave, Intended as a Companion to Powers' Greek Slave" also underlines American hypocrisy by making a direct reference to Powers' sculpture. The drawing was the work of English artist John Tenniel who would later illustrate Lewis Carroll's Alice in Wonderland. This cartoon appeared in Punch 20 June 7, 1851 where it received wide circulation. Tenniel used the pose of the Greek Slave, substituting a black slave from Virginia for the original white Greek figure. Virginia had been the first American location to receive African slaves in the 17th Century.

The third cartoon is entitled "American Planter's Armchair"(1851). The illustration was included in a 23 page book entitled The House that Paxton Built referring to the Crystal Palace. Each page had a hand-colored woodcut that lampooned selected exhibitions at the fair. The accompanying text which mentions that the American Planter's Armchair was made of ebony is a reference to the three black bodies that have formed a chair to support their master. The text went on to say that the chair was "a very free and easy invention supported on slavery." The planter/Slave Master is represented by Brother Jonathan, a symbol of America that predates the figure of Uncle Sam. The cartoon thus is meant to criticize American products on display that were produced by the nation's slave system.

The fourth cartoon "Sample of American Manufacture" appeared in the May 24, 1851 issue of Punch. In this example and the first cartoon we see Punch magazine's use of political cartoons to criticize an American economy where many of its manufactured goods were the products of slave labor. The illustration was part of an article in which the author openly criticized the American exhibitors for their hypocrisy:

"Why not have sent some specimens of slaves? We have the Greek Captive in dead stone---Why not the Virginian Slave in living ebony?...the writer adds: "Let America hire a black or two to stand in manacles, an American manufacture, protected by the American eagle." Such a patriotic eagle stands to the right carrying a whip and gesturing towards four manacled slaves

Illustrations:

a.The Shadow of English Liberty in America. Punch 19 May 11, 1850
by Richard Doyle.
b.The Virginian Slave as a Companion to Powers Greek Slave. Punch 20 June 7, 1851 by John Tenniel.
c. American Planter's Armchair. The House that Paxton Built, 1851 by George A. Sala, 1851
d. Sample of American Manufacture. Punch 20 May 24, 1851.
e. Powers Greek Slave to compare with Illustration b. The Virginian Slave

Next Time: Anti-Slavery Performances at the Fair to Protest Powers' Greek Slave

 

[Poppo]

A photo I took yesterday of Garibaldi in Santa Margherita ligure...sm3}

 

[PolarBear]

A photo I took yesterday of Garibaldi in Santa Margherita ligure...sm3}

Poppo

Thank you very much for this new addition to the Garibaldi Portrait Collection

Randy