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(American, 1855–1941)

The Weaver

1889
Oil on canvas
Image: 12 x 15 in. (30.5 x 38.1 cm)
Frame: 21 3/8 x 24 1/16 in. (54.3 x 61.1 cm)
Credit LineTerra Foundation for American Art, Daniel J. Terra Collection
Object number1988.23
SignedLower right: Geo. De. F. Brush/1889
Interpretation
In George de Forest Brush’s The Weaver, an Indian man, crouched in profile, guides a length of yarn through the warp threads of an upright hand loom in the dim interior of an earth-walled room, bare except for a scattering of objects that symbolize Native crafts and skills. A striped blanket, casually bunched, hangs from above, perhaps an earlier product of the weaver’s skill; behind his rude seat of logs covered by an animal skin sits a black clay jar incised with a bold abstract pattern. The most compelling element in the scene, however, is the body of the weaver himself. Nude except for a black sash secured by a silver-studded belt, he displays the ideal musculature and proportions that many white Americans in the nineteenth century associated with the Indian’s “primitive” existence in nature, a nearly extinct way of life.

Early in his career, Brush studied in Paris with French painter Jean-Léon Gérôme (1824–1904), from whom he absorbed not only an exacting technique and careful anatomical modeling of the figure but an interest in exotic subject matter. In the early 1880s, in search of exotic themes of his own, Brush spent long periods among American Indian tribes, studying their skills, making numerous sketches, and collecting artifacts. Soon after his first trip west, he established his reputation with the scenes of Indian life that would occupy him throughout the 1880s. Brush was among the last generation of American artists to witness Indian life in its “natural” state, relatively untainted by the impact of tourism on the reservations. While he painted painstakingly from actual artifacts for an air of authenticity, Brush refused to be constrained by anthropological fact. Instead, he borrowed freely from among his sources to create romanticized pastiches of Indian life that he felt would have greater universal appeal than would mere antiquarian documentation. In The Weaver, for example, the artisan’s costume and the earthen-walled setting suggest Pueblo culture; in contrast, the rug in process and the blanket hanging in the background display typical Navajo designs. In Navajo culture, however, women, not men, were the textile weavers, and weaving was generally done out-of-doors.

Brush’s choice of a male weaver points to the wider meaning of his theme. More than a relic of authentic native life, the weaver embodies the skill, care, and knowledge of the crafts worker, a rapidly disappearing figure in late-nineteenth-century America’s increasingly industrialized workplace and a symbol of the loss of authentic communal life in an age of intense urbanization. Nostalgic images of pre-industrial artisans and rural life were popular among Brush’s contemporaries. The Weaver is one of several works in which Brush treated this theme in the Indian context for which he was known. Working with precise technique informed by aesthetic sensibility, the dedicated weaver practicing his disappearing craft is a stand-in for the painter himself, an embattled idealist practicing a time-honored art increasingly under threat from mass-produced culture in general and from photography in particular.
ProvenanceThe artist
Charles M. Shipman
Frank Bulkeley Smith
Frank Bulkeley Smith Collection Sale, Plaza Hotel, New York, New York, April 22–23, 1920, no. 24
E. A. Milch
Francis P. Garvan
Berry-Hill Galleries, Inc., New York, New York
Daniel J. Terra Collection, Chicago, Illinois, 1985
Terra Foundation for the Arts Collection, Chicago, Illinois, 1988
Exhibition History
Twenty-first Annual Exhibition of the Society of American Artists, American Fine Arts Society, New York, New York, 1899, no. 340.

George de Forest Brush, 1855–1941: Master of the American Renaissance, Berry-Hill Galleries, Inc., New York, New York (organizer). Venues: Berry-Hill Galleries, Inc., New York, New York  November 12–December 14, 1985; Currier Gallery of Art, Manchester, New Hampshire, January 12–February 16, 1986; The Butler Institute of American Art, Youngstown, Ohio, March 2–April 20, 1986; Cheekwood Museum of Art, Nashville, Tennessee, May 17–July 6, 1986. [exh. cat.]

A Proud Heritage: Two Centuries of American Art, Terra Museum of American Art, Chicago, Illinois (organizer). Venue: Terra Museum of American Art, Chicago, Illinois, April 21–June 21, 1987. [exh. cat.]

On Process: Studio Themes, Terra Museum of American Art, Chicago, Illinois (organizer). Venue: Terra Museum of American Art, Chicago, Illinois, January 13–March 4, 2001.

Héroïque et le quotidien: les artistes américains, 1820–1920 (The Extraordinary and the Everyday: American Perspectives, 1820–1920), Musée d'Art Américain Giverny, France (organizer). Venue: Musée d'Art Américain Giverny, France, April 1–November 30, 2001. [exh. cat.]

American Classics: Selections from the Terra Foundation for the Arts, Terra Museum of American Art, Chicago, Illinois (organizer). Venue: Terra Museum of American Art, Chicago, Illinois, January 26–July 12, 2002.

From Looms Of Earth And Sky: Navajo Weavings From The Mitchell Museum Of The American Indian, Mitchell Museum of the American Indian, Kendall College, Evanston, Illinois (organizer). Venue: Terra Museum of American Art, Chicago, Illinois, July 20–September 1, 2002.

The People Work: American Perspectives, 1840–1940 (Le Travail à l'oeuvre: les artistes américains 1840–1940), Terra Museum of American Art, Chicago, Illinois (organizer). Venues: Terra Museum of American Art, Chicago, Illinois, March 15–May 25, 2003; Musée d'Art Américain Giverny, France, June 8–August 17, 2003. [exh. cat.]

George de Forest Brush: The Indian Paintings,  National Gallery of Art, Washington, DC (organizer).  Venues: National Gallery of Art, Washington, DC,  September 14, 2008–January 4, 2009; Seattle Art Museum, Seattle, Washington, February 26–May 24, 2009. [exh. cat.]

Art Across America, Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Los Angeles, California; Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, Texas; National Museum of Korea, Seoul, South Korea; Philadelphia Museum of Art, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania; Terra Foundation for American Art, Chicago, Illinois (organizers). Venues: National Museum of Korea, Seoul, South Korea, February 4–May 12, 2013; Daejeon Museum of Art, Daejeon, South Korea,  June 7–September 1, 2013. [exh. cat.]

ArtWork: Art and Labor, Sheldon Museum of Art, University of Nebraska, Lincoln, Nebraska (organizer). Venue: Sheldon Museum of Art, University of Nebraska, Lincoln, Nebraska, January 24–May 25, 2014. [exh.cat.]

Pathways to Modernism: American Art, 1865–1945, Art Institute of Chicago and Terra Foundation for American Art (organizers). Venue:  Shanghai Museum, Shanghai, China, September 28, 2018–January 6, 2019.   [exh. cat.]

Published References
Frank Bulkeley Smith Collection Sale, Plaza Hotel, New York, New York, (April 22–23, 1920): no. 24. Ill. no. 24.

A Sir Peter Lely, $1,500: Same Price for a Brush at Smith Sale--79 Paintings, $12,420, The New York Times (April 23, 1920).

Merrick, Lula C. "Brush's Indian Pictures." International Studio 76:307 (December 1922): 187–93. Ill. p. 192.

Bowditch, Nancy Douglas. George de Forest Brush: Recollections of a Joyous Painter. Peterborough, New Hampshire: Noone House, 1970. Text p. 35.

Gerdts, William H. Great American Nude. New York: Praeger Publishers, 1974. Text p. 135.

Morgan, Joan B. “The Indian Paintings of George de Forest Brush.” The American Art Journal 15, No. 2 (Spring 1983), 60-73. Text pp. 72, 73 n. 29.

Morgan, Joan B. George de Forest Brush, 1855–1941: Master of the American Renaissance. (exh. cat., Berry-Hill Galleries, Inc.). New York: Berry-Hill Galleries, Inc., 1985. Text p. 74; pl. I (color), ill. no. 25, p. 74 (black & white).

The Magazine Antiques 128 (November 1985): 803. Ill. p. 803 (color).

Walker, R. W. "Brush: Toward the Million-dollar Mark." Art News 85 (March 1986): 22. Ill. p. 22 (black & white).

Atkinson, D. Scott et al. A Proud Heritage: Two Centuries of American Art. Edited by Terry A. Neff. (exh. cat., Terra Museum of American Art). Chicago, Illinois: Terra Foundation for the Arts, 1987. Pl. T-85, p. 194 (color).

Gerdts, William H. et al. Lasting Impressions: American Painters in France, 1865–1915. (exh. cat., Musée d'Art Américain Giverny). Chicago, Illinois: Terra Foundation for the Arts, 1992. Text p. 31; fig. 17, p. 31 (black & white).

Gerdts, William H. et al. Impressions de toujours: les peintres américains en France, 1865–1915. (exh. cat., Musée d'Art Américain Giverny). Chicago, Illinois: Terra Foundation for the Arts, 1992. Text p. 31; fig. 17, p. 31 (black & white).

Cartwright, Derrick R. The Extraordinary and the Everyday: American Perspectives, 1820–1920. (exh. cat., Musée d'Art Américain Giverny). Chicago, Illinois: Terra Foundation for the Arts, 2001. Text p. 22 (checklist); ill. p. 41 (color).

Cartwright, Derrick R. L'Héroïque et le quotidian: les artistes américains, 1820–1920. (exh. cat., Musée d'Art Américain Giverny). Chicago, Illinois: Terra Foundation for the Arts, 2001. Text p. 22 (checklist); ill. p. 41 (color).

Shapiro, Emily Dana. 'Return to the Blanket?' George de Forest Brush's The Weaver and the Racial Politics of American Handicraft, Machine Crafted: The Imagine of the Artisan In American Genre Painting, 1877-1908. (PhD diss. Stanford University 2003) Text p 90–122; ill. fig. 73.

The People Work: American Perspectives, 1840–1940. (exh. cat., Terra Museum of American Art, Musée d’Art Américain). Giverny, France: Musée d’Art Américain, 2003. Text, p. 27 (checklist).

Anderson, Nancy K. George de Forest Brush: The Indian Paintings. (exh. cat., National Gallery of Art, Washington, DC). Washington, DC: National Gallery of Art, 2008. Text pp. 25, 52, 77, 81 n. 80, 84, 89, 90, 93, 95, 97 n. 3, 172, 212; ill. cat. 18 p. 173 (color).

Hutchinson, Elizabeth. The Indian Craze: Primitivism, Modernism, and Transculturation in American Art, 1890–1915. Durham and London: Duke University Press, 2009. Text p. 105; pl. 7 (color).

Southgate, M. Therese. The Art of JAMA III: Covers and Essays from the Journal of the American Medical Association. Chicago, Illinois: American Medical Association, 2011. Text p. 66; ill. opposite p. 66 (color).

ArtWork: Art and Labor. (exh. cat., Sheldon Museum of Art). Lincoln, Nebraska: Sheldon Museum of Art, University of Nebraska, 2014. Text, p. 3, 21, 44 (checklist); ill. p. 2 (detail; color); p. 25, fig. 13 (color).

Art Across America. (exh. cat., National Museum of Korea, Los Angeles County Museum of Art, The Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, Philadelphia Museum of Art and the Terra Foundation for American Art). Seoul, South Korea: National Museum of Korea, 2013. (English and Korean versions). Text pp. 34, 103, 400 (checklist); ill. p. 34, fig. 12 (color); p. 102 (color).

Pathways to Modernism: American Art, 1865-1945. (exh. cat. Shanghai Museum with Art Institute of Chicago and Terra Foundation for American Art). Shanghai: Shanghai Museum, 2018. Text p. 34; ill. p. 35 (color).

Bourguignon, Katherine M., and Peter John Brownlee, eds. Conversations with the Collection: A Terra Foundation Collection Handbook. Chicago: Terra Foundation for American Art, 2018. Text p. 131; ill. p. 131 (color).

metedata embedded, 2020
George de Forest Brush
1907