Blind Man's Buff

Children playing a variety of familiar games crowd a humble interior in Blind Man’s Buff, one of John Lewis Krimmel’s typical genre scenes, or images of everyday life. The game of blind man’s buff, in which a blindfolded child tries to catch and identify other players, is the focus of the scene, as emphasized by the highlighting of the designated “blind man,” her arms outstretched to reach the closest fellow-player. Other children play peek-a-boo and hide-and-seek as a curious cat peers into an iron pot, at left, and a dog romps with a boy in the background. Near the fireplace, a man observes the action while lighting his cigar by a hot ember from the fire. Opposite him, a boy cautions another against his intended mischief of tripping the “blind man” with the stool. The atmosphere of convivial enjoyment is only heightened by contrast with the bawling boy who falls to the floor by the rocking chair of his mother as she reaches down smilingly to comfort him.

Around the figures, functional implements of everyday labor furnish the unpretentious living and cooking space, with its beamed ceiling and bare floor. At the left, the idle broom and the washtub filled with soaking laundry hint at a relentless round of unfinished chores. Juxtaposed with the happy, prosperous appearance of the figures and the comfortable aspect of the snug interior, however, the evidence of abandoned work may be read as a signal not of reprehensible laziness but of the virtue of wholesome respite, a refreshing necessity for children and grownups alike.

Blind Man’s Buff is typical of Krimmel’s interior genre scenes. The first artist to make American life the subject of his art, he nonetheless drew on numerous precedents. The poses of several figures in Blind Man’s Buff reflect the artist’s familiarity with grand mythological history paintings by old and modern masters. Additionally, the work’s shallow, stage-like setting, multiplicity of figures and action, still-life detail, and gently humorous tone were influenced by the works of seventeenth-century Dutch as well as modern British and German artists. Such sources were known in America from reproductive prints and painted copies.

Krimmel's own works were popularized in engravings. For although his genre paintings found few patrons in his day, their vivid representation of contemporary life sounded a chord among contemporaries: accessible and affirmative, works such as Blind Man's Buff expressed Americans' growing search for national self-identity and passion for self-imaging in the early years of the young republic. Such Krimmel works as the Terra Foundation collection's Blind Fiddler (TF 1999.81) and Blind Man's Buff, companion paintings since they were exhibited together in the artist's lifetime, heralded the golden age of American genre painting in the decades before the Civil War.

Exhibition, American Academy of Fine Arts, New York, New York, 1820, no. 79.

Nineteenth Century Genre Painting from The Daniel J. Terra Collection, Terra Museum of American Art, Evanston, Illinois (organizer). Venue: Terra Museum of American Art, Evanston, Illinois, November 15, 1985–January 12, 1986.

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.]

Selections from the Permanent Collection: Life in 19th Century America, Terra Museum of American Art, Chicago, Illinois (organizer). Venue: Terra Museum of American Art, Chicago, Illinois, June 24–September 6, 1987.

Art of an Emergent Nation: American Painting 1775–1865, University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee Art Museum, Milwaukee, Wisconsin (organizer). Venue: University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee Art Museum, Milwaukee, Wisconsin, February 14–March 27, 1988 (as Blind Man's Bluff). [exh. cat.]

Collection Cameo, Terra Museum of American Art, Chicago, Illinois, October 1988.

Domestic Bliss: Family Life in American Art, Terra Museum of American Art, Chicago, Illinois (organizer). Venue: Terra Museum of American Art, Chicago, Illinois, April 12–June 22, 1997.

New Faces, New Places: Recent Additions to the Terra Foundation for the Arts Collection, Terra Museum of American Art, Chicago, Illinois (organizer). Venue: Terra Museum of American Art, Chicago, Illinois, October 14–December 31, 2000.

L'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.]

Culture Revisited: Samuel F. B. Morse's 'Gallery of the Louvre,' Terra Museum of American Art, Chicago, Illinois (organizer). Venue: Terra Museum of American Art, Chicago, Illinois, July 12–November 3, 2002.

A Place on the Avenue: Terra Museum of American Art Celebrates 15 Years in Chicago, Terra Museum of American Art, Chicago, Illinois (organizer). Venue: Terra Museum of American Art, Chicago, Illinois, November 16, 2002–February 16, 2003 (on exhibit extended run: November 2, 2002–March 2, 2003).

Copley to Cassatt: Masterworks from the Terra Collection, New Britain Museum of American Art, New Britain, Connecticut, and Terra Museum of American Art, Chicago, Illinois (organizer). Venue: New Britain Museum of American Art, New Britain, Connecticut, September 5–December 7, 2003.

A Narrative of American Art, Terra Museum of American Art, Chicago, Illinois (organizer). Venue: Terra Museum of American Art, Chicago, Illinois, February 13–October 31, 2004.

Le Temps des loisirs : peintures américaines (At Leisure: American Paintings), Musée d'Art Américain Giverny, France (organizer). Venue: Musée d'Art Américain Giverny, France, July 15–October 31, 2007.

Le Temps des loisirs : peintures américaines (At Leisure: American Paintings), Musée d'Art Américain Giverny, France (organizer). Venue: Musée d'Art Américain Giverny, France, April 1–October 31, 2008.

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, February 4– May 12, 2013; Daejeon Museum of Art, Daejeon, South Korea, June 7–September 1, 2013. [exh. cat.]

America: Painting a Nation, Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Los Angeles, California; Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, Texas; Philadelphia Museum of Art, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania; Terra Foundation for American Art, Chicago, Illinois, Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney, Australia (organizers). Venue: Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney, Australia, November 9, 2013–February 8, 2014. [exh. cat]

Dunlap, William. A History of the Rise and Progress of the Arts of Design in the United States. 3 Vol. New York: George P. Scott & Company, 1834. Vol. 2: text pp. 392–93.

Jackson, Joseph. "Krimmel, 'The American Hogarth.'" International Studio (June 1929): 33–37, 86. Text p. 37.

Naeve, Milo. "John Lewis Krimmel: His Life, His Art and His Critics." Master's thesis. Newark, Delaware: University of Delaware, 1955.

The Magazine Antiques 124 (November 1983): 875. Ill. (color).

Christie's, New York, New York (Sale 5472, December 9, 1983): lot 5. Text p. 14; ill. lot 5, p. 15 (color).

Sokol, David M. "The Terra Museum of American Art, Evanston, Illinois." The Magazine Antiques 126:5 (November 1984): 1156–69. Pl. II, p. 1156 (color).

Naeve, Milo. John Lewis Krimmel: An Artist in Federal America. Newark, Delaware: University of Delaware Press, 1987. Ill. no. 5, p. 75 (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. Text p. 118; pl. T-9, p. 118 (color).

Brazeau, Linda. Art of an Emergent Nation: American Painting 1775–1865. (exh. cat., University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee). Milwaukee, Wisconsin: University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee Art Museum, 1988. Text p. 15; ill. p. 24 (black & white as Blind Man's Bluff).

Blind Man's Buff, John Lewis Krimmel. Collection Cameo sheet, Terra Museum of American Art, Chicago, Illinois, October 1988. Ill. (black and white).

Harding, Anneliese. John Lewis Krimmel: Genre Artist of the Early Republic. Winterthur, Delaware: The Henry Francis du Pont Winterthur Museum, 1994. Text pp. 67, 70; ill. p. 68 (color).

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. 23 (checklist); ill. p. 25 (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. 23 (checklist); ill. p. 25 (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. 62; ill. opposite p. 62 (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. 35, 143; ill. fig. 18, p. 36 (color), p. 142 (color).

America: Painting a Nation. (exh. cat., Art Gallery of New South Wales, the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, the National Museum of Korea, the Philadelphia Museum of Art and the Terra Foundation for American Art). Sydney, Australia: Art Gallery of New South Wales, 2013. Text p. 78; ill. cat. no. 13, p. 79 (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. 27; ill. p. 27 (color).