Arthur Fitzwilliam Tait’s The Reprimand was commissioned as a portrait of the young Mary Elizabeth O
Arthur Fitzwilliam Tait’s The Reprimand was commissioned as a portrait of the young Mary Elizabeth Osborn. He portrayed the girl in a fanciful tableau set in what appears to be a small open-air porch surrounded by a collection of imported objects. The subject appears to derive from an English work by Tait’s role model Sir Edwin Landseer, which also presents a Romantic narrative featuring a young girl and a deer in a rustic, grotto-like shelter. What marks this scene as distinctly American, however, is the small, beaded Indian purse that has fallen beneath the stool on the bottom right of the canvas, an example of the type produced by the Seneca Nation of Iroquois in western New York State for commercial trade from about 1840 to 1860.Posted by Eliza Butler -- source link
#bkmamericanart#the reprimand#girl#fanciful#tableau#open air#porch#imported#objects#romantic#narrative#young#deer#rustic#grotto#shelter#american#beaded#indian#purse#canvas#seneca#seneca nation#iroquois#new york#commercial#trade