1964.27: Council of Ministers

Identification and Creation

Object Number

1964.27

People

Unidentified Artist
Previously attributed to Nathaniel Emmons, American (Boston, MA 1704 - 1740 Boston, MA)

Title

Council of Ministers

Classification

Paintings

Work Type

painting

Date

c. 1744

Places

Creation Place: North America, United States, Massachusetts, Newburyport

Culture

American

Persistent Link

https://hvrd.art/o/311355

Physical Descriptions

Medium

Oil on wood panel

Dimensions

77.3 x 106 cm (30 7/16 x 41 3/4 in.)
framed: 87 x 113 x 2.9 cm (34 1/4 x 44 1/2 x 1 1/8 in.)

Provenance

Recorded Ownership History

Painted for the State Street, Newburyport home of Rev. John Lowell, c. 1744; upon his death in 1767, the building passes to his son, John Lowell, Jr.; the building sold to Patrick Tracy in 1771 and moved from State Street to Temple Street; purchased by George Fitz, 1851, at approximately which time seemingly purchased or gifted to James Russell Lowell through T.W. Higginson and transferred to his home, Elmwood, Cambridge, MA, thence through the owners of Elmwood; Prof. Arthur Kingsley Porter, to his wife, Lucy Kingsley Porter; Dr. Francis Lowell Burnett and Mrs. Esther Lowell C. Burnett.

Acquisition and Rights

Credit Line

Harvard Art Museums/Fogg Museum, Gift of Dr. Francis L. Burnett and Mrs. Esther Lowell Cunningham

Accession Year

1964

Object Number

1964.27

Division

European and American Art

Contact

am_europeanamerican@harvard.edu

Permissions

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Publication History

• "An Old Relic", The Newburyport Herald (Newburyport, MA, July 16, 1841), vol. XL, n.p.
• Thomas Wentworth Higginson, "For the Herald", The Newburyport Herald (Newburyport, MA, March 25, 1850), vol. XVIII, n.p.
• Mrs. E. Vale Smith, History of Newburyport (Newburyport, MA, 1854), p. 330
• George Lunt, ed., Old New England Traits (New York, NY, 1873), pp. 52-53
• F. H. Underwood, "James Russell Lowell", Harper's Weekly (1881), vol. LXII, p. 254
• Professor Charles Eliot Norton, ed., Letters of James Russell Lowell (New York, NY, 1894), p. 170, see letter of 1/23/1850
• John J. Currier, Ould Newbury (Boston, MA, 1896), pp. 451-452
• Sarah Anna Emery, Reminiscences of a Nonagenarian (Newburyport, MA, 1896), p. 205
• Louise Karr, "A Council of Ministers", The Magazine Antiques (1927), vol. 2, pp. 45-46, ill. p. 45
• James Truslow Adams, Provincial Society, 1690-1763, The Macmillan Company (New York, NY, 1927), p. 154, pl.
• Alan Burroughs, "An Early Overmantle", Art in America (1941), vol. 29, pp. 227-229, ill. opp. p. 223
• Nina Fletcher Little, American Decorative Wall Painting: 1700-1850 (Sturbridge, MA, 1952), p. 46, fig. 47
• Kenyon Castle Bolton, III, Peter G. Huenink, Earl A. Powell III, Harry Z. Rand, and Nanette C. Sexton, American Art at Harvard, exh. cat., Fogg Art Museum (Cambridge, MA, 1972), cat. 3, ill.
• John Dillenberger, The Visual Arts and Christianity in America: The Colonial Period through the Nineteenth Century, Scholars Press (Chico, CA, 1984), pl. 3
• Peter Benes, "Artists in Newbury and Newburyport before 1835", Essex Institute Historical Collections (1985), vol. 212, pp. 225-26, pp. 225-26
• Peter Benes, Old-Town and the Waterside, exh. cat., Historical Society of Old Newbury (Newburyport, MA, 1986), p. 91, no. 72, ill.
• Theodore E. Stebbins, Jr. and Melissa Renn, American Paintings at Harvard, Volume One: Paintings, Watercolors, and Pastels by Artists Born before 1826, Yale University Press (U.S.) and Harvard Art Museums (Cambridge and New Haven, 2014), pp. 486-87, cat. 450, ill.

Exhibition History

• American Art at Harvard, Fogg Art Museum, Cambridge, 04/19/1972 - 06/18/1972

Verification Level