Rare Maps and Prints
- World & Celestial
- North America
- West Indies, South & Central America
- British Isles
- British Isles
- English counties
- Large-scale
- Bedfordshire
- Berkshire
- Buckinghamshire
- Cambridgeshire
- Cheshire
- Cornwall
- Cumberland
- Derbyshire
- Devon
- Dorset
- Durham
- Essex
- Gloucestershire
- Hampshire
- Herefordshire
- Hertfordshire
- Huntingdonshire
- Islands
- Kent
- Lancashire
- Leicestershire
- Lincolnshire
- Middlesex
- Norfolk
- Northamptonshire
- Northumberland
- Nottinghamshire
- Oxfordshire
- Rutland
- Shropshire
- Somerset
- Staffordshire
- Suffolk
- Surrey
- Sussex
- Warwickshire
- Westmoreland
- Wiltshire
- Worcestershire
- Yorkshire
- Wales
- Scotland
- Ireland
- Western Europe
- Eastern Europe
- Middle East
- Africa
- Asia
- Australasia & Pacific
- Decorative Prints
- Title Pages
Mr. Philip D. Burden
P.O. Box 863,
Chalfont St. Giles, Bucks HP6 9HD,
UNITED KINGDOM
Tel: +44 (0) 1494 76 33 13
Email: enquiries@caburden.com
1. RESEARCH AT THE NEW YORK PUBLIC LIBRARY
A 1956 issue of the ‘Florida Historical Quarterly’ suggested that the portrait is of Osceola and the painter Robert John Curtis. An article by the esteemed scholar of American Indian material, John M. Goggin, details the circumstances of this portraiture.
Osceola was a romantic hero in the tradition of the ‘good outlaw’ whose exploits, by the year 1837, had utterly captivated the popular imagination in America. Resisting the relocation of his people from Florida to Arkansas, he initiated the Second Seminole War, fighting the U.S. Army to a standstill in seven years of guerrilla action out of the Everglades and Florida backlands. He was captured only under a flag of truce on the orders of General Thomas Jesup (1788-1860) in October 1837. At the end of the year he was transferred to a compound at Fort Moultrie, South Carolina, with a number of his braves. To this point, the only likeness taken of Osceola from life appears to have been a sketch by Robert Vinton, now lost.
In the month before his death Osceola was visited by two artists. The first was Robert John Curtis, sometime by the first week or so of January 1838. Curtis was a well-known and academically trained portraitist in Charleston, whose patron and mentor was Dr. Robert L. Baker, a well-to-do and farsighted local man. Curtis’s advertisements for portrait sittings appear regularly in the ‘Charleston Mercury’ during this period, and his portrait of Rev. John Bachman, Audubon’s close friend and collaborator, still hangs in the German Friendly Society in Charleston.
It was Dr. Baker who commissioned Curtis to do a portrait of Osceola, and who used his influence to arrange a sitting. His grand-daughter, Mrs. R. L. Kinloch, reported of this portrait that ‘it was so good that when members of his tribe saw it they gave a war whoop’.
The portrait was put on display at Dr. Baker’s offices in Char1eston for several days in early January. The ‘Charleston Mercury’ reports on January 8 that ‘the artist has given, with great fidelity, the intelligent and melancholy countenance which distinguishes the chief’.
Two weeks later Curtis announced in the ‘Charleston Mercury’ that he would provide versions of his portrait of the great chief to interested buyers for thirty dollars each. This is actually a fairly grand sum at the time, being the same amount that the famous Charles Bird King received for each portrait in Washington D.C. in the same year. Mr. Goggin does not record the existence or location of these further versions, buy only reports ‘it is possible that more than one example of an Osceola portrait by Curtis exists’.
Meanwhile, at the Federal level, a visit to paint Osceola had been arranged by George Catlin and he was enroute to Charleston. Catlin was of course the most flamboyant and widely known of early 19th century Indian painters, and for him Osceola was a cause celebre – a living representative of the United States’s brutal Indian policies. He intended to widely reproduce his painting of Osceola and thereby further both the Red Man’s cause and his own. He laid great stress on the fame of Osceola and the assertion that ‘his portrait has never yet been painted. When Catlin finally arrived, Osceola had only five days to live. Curtis’ portrait was at this moment on display at Dr. Baker’s. Catlin made two paintings from his visit. The first is a half-length closely resembling Curtis’ composition, now at the National Portrait Gallery in Washington. The second is a full-length in dramatic standing posture, now in the Museum of Natural History in New York. Lithographs and copies of Catlin’s work were made and widely distributed. The rare book room of the New York Public Library has one of these inscribed in Catlin’s own hand to his friend Pierre Marfry as follows: ‘Osceola, a Brave of the Seminola Indians, of Florida, who shot down his own chief, Charly Omatta, when he signed the Treaty under which his tribe was to be removed from their country. He then assumed the command during the 8 years of the disastrous Florida (or Seminola) war. G. C.’
2 . NATIONAL PORTRAIT GALLERY, WASHINGTON
Being now fairly certain in our own minds as to the date and authorship of Osceola, we met with Dr. Robert Truettner and Mr. Monroe Fabian at the National Portrait Gallery to share these findings and seek further guidance. (Dr. Truettner is the expert on early Western art who created the Smithsonian’s definitive Catlin exhibit.) They were fascinated by the discovery of this painting. After studying the available material, they had it catalogued into the National Portrait Gallery archives as a recorded R. J. Curtis.
3 . FLAGLER MUSEUM
The Curtis Osceola at the Flagler Museum is in fact owned by Flagler College, but, in the custody and care of the Museum. It was acquired by Henry M. Flagler in the last quarter of the 19th century and hung in his Ponce de Leon Hotel, built in 1887. Henry Flagler was the tycoon industrialist who built the Florida railroads and developed much of the State and nearly all of early Palm Beach. It was cleaned in 1971, but still carries an early varnish which is much yellowed, and dark. The Museum Curator, Mr. Ken Jones, was previously Curator at the Charleston Museum where he was responsible for their Curtis Osceola, and its cleaning and conservation which occurred in 1978. Aside from his other qualifications, we were keen to get his expertise because he is perhaps the only person who has lived and worked so closely with both paintings physically over a period of time.
The painting was brought to Palm Beach and placed physically side by side with the Flagler and compared as to colour, composition, brushstoke structure, detailing and technical competence. Allowing for the varnish, the colour and atmosphere were found virtually identical. Composition is the same except for the opening out of our portrait with additional sky to the left and top. Brushwork, modelling, and articulation of the facial features are similar to a fine point. Detailing is the same in every significant point, but not as to exact placement of the flowers on the jacket, for example. The gorgets around Osceola’s neck are the same and lack, in both pictures, a little edging ridge which appears in the Charleston painting. Our painting was observed to lack the highlights in the eyes and to have a slightly different expression in the right-hand side to the mouth. Our conclusion from this study was that there is no doubt the two paintings were done by the same hand.
This study in fact concluded in our minds any speculation as to the identity and author of this Osceola portrait. Mr. Jones fully concurred and was kind enough to follow up with a letter expressing the finding.
4. UNIVERSITY OF SOUTH CAROLINA
The painting was then taken to the University in Columbia, South Carolina, to be shown to Ms. Anna Wells Rutledge, as suggested by Dr. Truettner. Mrs. Rutledge has done the definitive study of South Carolina arts and artists, now being published by the U.S.C. Press. She has tracked art owned and done by South Carolina settlers from the 16th century and researched the lives and works of every known South Carolina painter. She is a marvellous and daunting character in her 80’s, a Southern scholar of the old school who advised us in no uncertain terms that she does not do letters. She shared our excitement at the discovery of this canvas, however, and verbally expressed the observation that it is simply and clearly a Curtis ‘Osceola’. She was able to show us the list of dates of each time Curtis had advertised for portrait sittings in the ‘Charleston Mercury’ of the 1820’s and 1830’s; and it was her files that revealed that Curtis had also done the portrait of the Reverend John Bachman, whose two daughters married the two sons of John James Audubon.
5. THE CHARLESTON MUSEUM
We then took the painting to Charleston. Our purpose again was to put the two side by side and see what could be learned. The Charleston example is the one which was owned by Dr. Baker and was given by his grand-daughter to the Museum in 1929. It is inscribed by the artist on the verso. Though sketchier in detail and looser in brushwork, it is fully consistent stylistically with both other versions. A small difference is the handling of the edges of the gorgets, which has the addition of an etched line. Other details are the same, and no surprises were encountered in this respect. An amusing consequence of this visit, however, was the discovery by Museum personnel of a formerly unnoticed signature by Curtis in the second gorget. This signature had gone unremarked for 150 years. We also put Osceola under the Museum’s ‘black light’ on this occasion. It has been earlier noted that this Osceola does not have the white highlights on his eyes. Under ultra-violet, a small dot was revealed at the correct spot in each eye, demonstrating that the highlights had been painted out very carefully at a more recent date. Also there was found to have been a small restoration at the right side of the mouth. The sky had some very early repair, but the face and figure are otherwise clean and the painting as a whole in fine condition for its age.
As a side note, we learned in Charleston that the city has always had strong Huguenot ties, which would explain the discovery of this painting in France.
6. SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION
Dr. William Sturtevant of the Anthropology Department of the Smithsonian is the leading American expert on accuracy of detail of dress and ethnography in Indian images. We had been referred to him both by the National Portrait Gallery and the Museum of the American Indian in New York. Dr. Sturtevant has a file on Curtis’ Osceola including slides taken personally before the Charleston Osceola had been repaired and restored. He was pleased to file our material and concurred with the basic conclusions. He informed us specifically that the details of dress and ornamentation are more accurate in the Curtis than in the Catlin portrait, particularly as regards jacket, beadwork and sash. He felt there was validity to the hypothesis that Catlin had been influenced by Curtis’ portrait, due to the striking similarity in composition of the two. We discussed the possibility that Catlin, arriving five days before Osceola’s death, may have never had a proper sitting and had to create his portrait from a sketch. He found no inaccuracies at all in the Curtis depiction.
7. FRICK LIBRARY
As a final point of interest, we unearthed in the unsorted ‘supply’ files at the Frick Library, evidence of one further R.J. Curtis Osceola, whereabouts unknown. This example is 30″ x 25″ and was once in the collection of William Randolph Hearst – who owned only four American portraits. It was sold by Hammer Galleries in 1941, misattributed to John Neagle, and is not now locatable.
COMMENTS AND COMPARISONS
A careful side-by-side examination of the Burden Osceola with those in the Charleston Museum and the Flagler Museum revealed the following points:
a. The quality of brushwork is similar in all three paintings, with the difference that the first (Charleston) version is looser and sketchier. It was evidently painted faster. Articulation of brow, nose, hair, eyelids, etc. are perfectly consistent both in terms of style, structure and level of skill.
b. The Charleston canvas has a little ridging around the gorgets which is missing in the Burden and Flagler examples. According to Dr. Sturtevant, the ridging is a correct detail. Why Curtis would have left it out in the other versions is not known, but the significant point is that he did so in both.
c. There is an exact pattern in the bangs over Osceola’s forehead which is present in both the Charleston and Burden examples but absent in the Flagler.
d. Allowing for old varnish on the Charleston and especially the Flagler paintings, the colour and light quality are consistent in all three works.
e. The Burden canvas is larger and its composition has been opened out by the addition of more sky to the top and left sides. The actual figure of Osceola is only fractionally larger than the other two. The sizes are these: Charleston: 31″ x 27.5″; Flagler: 30″ x 25″; Burden: 35″ x 28″.
f. Ultraviolet examination shows a restoration to the right edge of Osceola’s mouth on the Burden picture which slightly alters the expression. This version also lacks the white highlights in the eyes. Under UV, however, the dots are shown to be there but to have been precisely overpainted at a later time.
g. The clothing is more carefully and literally rendered in the Flagler and Burden paintings. The differences here are purely in rapidity of treatment.
SUMMARY
To supplement this narrative, we have included photographs and photocopies of relevant documents and the other two Curtis Osceola portraits; and the complete text of Goggin’s article, whose bibliography is also of interest.
The preceding experiences and information have left us with no doubt as to the authenticity of the picture. We would only add our concurrence with Goggin that Curtis’ work is the best Osceola portrait ever done, as to aesthetics and accuracy. Of the three known examples, this is the largest and, in some ways, the most pleasing in scale, because of the more spacious sky. Arguably, then, it is the best portrait in existence of one of America’s bravest heroes.
Goggin, John M. (1955). ‘Osceola: Portraits, Features, and Dress’, in ‘Florida Historical Society’ Vol. 33, January-April 1955, pp. 161-305. Correspondence with Herman Viola and William Truettner, National Museum of American Art, Smithsonian (30 May 1985).
Osceola
SOLD