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

Public Domain

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Artist Joseph Dunkerley(English, active America 1776–1806)English, 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

Not on view

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Department

Rienzi

Object Type

MINIATURE (PORTRAITS)

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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