Joseph Dunkerley
Portrait of a Gentleman, Reputed to be Abraham Clark

ArtistEnglish, active America 1776–1806
CultureEnglish
Titles
  • Portrait of a Gentleman, Reputed to be Abraham Clark
Date1781
Made inBoston, Massachusetts, United States
MediumWatercolor on ivory
DimensionsPanel: 1 1/2 × 1 1/8 in. (3.8 × 2.9 cm)
Frame (outer): 1 13/16 × 1 1/4 × 1/8 in. (4.6 × 3.2 × 0.3 cm)
Credit LineThe Rienzi Collection, gift of James Deegan
Object number2014.1036
Non exposé

Explore Further

Department
Rienzi
ProvenanceThe subject’s daughter, Sarah Clark Edgar; her daughter, Henrietta Edgar; by descent to her first cousin, Wilhelmina Edgar; given to Fedora Edgar, New York; by descent to Henry C. Edgar, Lakeville, New York; by descent to James A. Edgar, New York, 1963; (Elle Shushan, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania); James Deegan, Houston, Texas, 2014.

While there are no other firmly documented portraits of Abraham Clark, this miniature has descended through generations of the Clark family with the sitter’s identity preserved through word of mouth.

Exhibition History"Radicals and Revolutionaries: America's Founding Fathers," Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, March 10–May 28, 2018.
Inscriptions, Signatures and Marks
The miniature is signed in the lower right “ID/1781”.
Signed and dated LR: ID\1781

Cataloguing data may change with further research.

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