June 4-September 8, 2002
The Henry R. Luce Study Center for the Study of American Art, The American Wing
Early 19th–century America will be the focus of this year's Summer Selections, the second annual installation drawn from the Metropolitan Museum's collection of works on paper created by American artists between 1710 and 1920. This summer's exhibition — which coincides with the Metropolitan's presentation of the landmark traveling exhibition Thomas Eakins — will feature the work of two artists active in Philadelphia, Eakins's hometown, in the decades preceding his birth. Some 50 watercolors — including genre scenes, landscapes, and portraits — primarily by the Russian diplomat Pavel Petrovich Svinin (1787/88–1839), along with several works recently attributed to the German émigré John Lewis Krimmel (1786–1821), will be shown. Many of the works document street life in Philadelphia, where Krimmel lived and where Svinin was headquartered for two–and–a–half years.
In 1811, when the Russian diplomat Pavel Petrovich Svinin was posted to Philadelphia, the city was more prominent than either Boston or New York. One of the first Russians to visit the United States, he traveled widely along the East Coast, taking notes and sketching for a travelogue, several articles, and a substantial group of watercolors that constitute an important body of information about the period. The watercolor sketch Two Indians and a White Man (Probably the Artist) (1811–ca. 1813) presents an idealized view of the American wilderness, which is shown as expansive, not threatening. In the canoe, harmony exists between the Indians at the oars and the white man who is the passenger.
Born and raised in Germany, John Lewis Krimmel arrived in America at about the same time as Svinin, but took up permanent residence here. In a career that spanned barely ten years, Krimmel — the first American artist to specialize in genre painting — produced a small, but significant, body of sketches, watercolors, and oil paintings depicting public life in Philadelphia. The works — many of which were originally attributed to Svinin — show an evolution from sparsely populated urban scenes to complex street scenes in which the civic rituals of the new republic are shown in a moralizing manner, reminiscent of the British artist William Hogarth. The holdings at the Metropolitan represent Krimmel's early style.
The watercolor Nightlife in Philadelphia — an Oyster Barrow in Front of the Chestnut Street Theatre (1811– ca. 1813) documents a quick evening repast enjoyed by three dandies out for the evening. The food vendor's cart — a wheelbarrow full of oysters — has a shelf and a ledge for plates, condiments, utensils, and a lantern. The stand is staffed by a black man, shown shucking an oyster, and a white woman, who holds a plate at the ready in one hand while the candle in her other hand illuminates the scene.
The Web site for the Metropolitan (www.metmuseum.org) will feature the exhibition.
The exhibition is organized by Kevin J. Avery, Associate Curator, and Claire A.
Conway, Research Assistant, Department of American Paintings and Sculpture.
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June 3, 2002
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