- Title
- The Young Artist
- Date Made
- circa 1838-1839
- Medium
- Oil on canvas
- Dimensions
- Canvas: 54 × 41 in. (137.16 × 104.14 cm)
Frame: 61 1/4 × 48 1/4 × 3 in. (155.58 × 122.56 × 7.62 cm)
- Accession Number
- AC1992.70.1
- Collecting Area
- American Art
- Curatorial Notes
Exhibition Label, 1997
Randall Palmer was an itinerant portrait painter active during the 1820s and 1830s around Syracuse in western New York. Paintings such as The Young Artist, with its scale and complexity, indicate that he was far more accomplished than typical early provincial artists. Palmer excelled at meticulous details, here seen in the caned seat and veneer of the Empire chair and the patterned floor decoration. His instruction of several students may have inspired this painting. A young artist is shown seated before an easel, surrounded by the tools of the profession. A portfolio of prints on the floor behind his chair and a partly open book of landscapes show the sources used by the beginner, while the busts of George Washington and Benjamin Franklin – similar to works by the Philadelphia sculptor Benamin Rush – indicate another important field of artistic endeavor. This colorful folk image conveys the simplicity of most Americans, who still had a relatively unsophisticated lifestyle in rural areas.
