Ohio History Journal
NANCY SAHLI
A Lost Portrait?
Frank Duveneck Paints
Elizabeth Blackwell
Frank Duveneck was probably Ohio's best
known artist during the
late nineteenth and early twentieth
centuries, and is certainly one
whose reputation has been sustained to
the present day. Born in
Covington, Kentucky, in 1848, he began
his career decorating
churches in the United States and
Canada. In 1870 he traveled to
Munich to study with Wilhelm von Diez,
returning three years later to
Cincinnati. By 1877, Duveneck's
reputation had been firmly
established, chiefly as a result of his
one-man show two years before
at the Boston Art Club. Indeed, it was
Henry James who remarked in
his article on the exhibition in The
Nation that "the discovery of an
unsuspected man of genius is always an
interesting event, and
nowhere perhaps could such an event
excite a higher relish than in
the aesthetic city of Boston."1
Despite the inducements, however,
which Duveneck received to stay in that
city, including several
immediate orders for portraits, the
artist decided to return to Europe.
Not until 1890 would he return to
Cincinnati and to a distinguished
teaching career which lasted until his
death in 1919.
Around the same time that Duveneck was
born, in 1848, another
Cincinnati resident, Elizabeth
Blackwell, was beginning her second
year of study at Geneva Medical College
in Geneva, New York. She
was a native of Bristol England; in
1832, at the age of eleven, she had
emigrated to the United States with her
family. In 1838, after
spending a few financially unsuccessful
years in New York City, the
Blackwells moved to Cincinnati, where
Elizabeth's father, Samuel,
intended to start a sugar refinery. His
unexpected death shortly after
their arrival ended this scheme, and as
a financial necessity the family
organized a school, the Cincinnati
English and French Academy for
Dr. Sahli is a graduate of Vassar
College and The University of Pennsylvania, and is
employed currently as an archivist for
the National Historical Publications and Records
Commission, Washington, D.C.
1. Mahonri Sharp Young, "Duveneck
and Henry James: A Study in Contrasts,"
Apollo, XCII, no. 103 (September 1970), 212.
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320 OHIO HISTORY |
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Young Ladies. Elizabeth taught there for a few years, but by 1845 she had decided to pursue a medical career. After two years of private study she was accepted at the Geneva school, where she graduated in 1849, thereby becoming the first woman medical school graduate in the United States. Throughout the years, an accepted part of Duveneck scholarship has been that in 1877, on his way from Germany to Italy, the artist stopped briefly in Austria, where he painted a portrait of Susan B. Anthony, one of the leaders of the American women's suffrage movement.2 The truth of this assertion is, however, highly suspect.
2. See Ibid., 213; Cincinnati Museum Association, Exhibition of the Work of Frank Duveneck (Cincinnati, 1936), 81; Josephine W. Duveneck, Frank Duveneck: Painter-Teacher (San Francisco, 1970), 66-67; Frank Duveneck (New York, 1972), unpaged. The Cincinnati exhibition catalogue claims that the portrait was done in 1887, while the Young article gives Salzburg, rather than Innsbruck, the more commonly |
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Frank Duveneck 321 |
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There is no example in the Duveneck literature of either a photographic reproduction or a verbal description of the work. Moreover, in the spring of 1877 Susan B. Anthony was in Kansas caring for her dying sister, Hannah Mosher. There is also no reference in the standard biography of Anthony to any portrait by Duveneck.3 There is, however, in the Blackwell Family Papers in the Library of Congress, correspondence describing a portrait of
accepted site, as the location of the sitting. Various companions, such as Louis Ritter, John W. Alexander, William Merritt Chase, and John H. Twachtman, are alleged by these authors to have accompanied Duveneck on his way from Munich to Italy. However, since no such companions are mentioned in the Blackwell papers, which are apparently the only surviving documentation for this period of Duveneck's career, it would seem most probable that he made the journey alone. 3. Ida Husted Harper, The Life and Work of Susan B. Anthony, 3 vols. (Indianapolis, 1898-1908). Susan B. Anthony did not make a trip to Europe until 1883 |
322 OHIO HISTORY
Elizabeth Blackwell painted by Duveneck
in Innsbruck, Austria, in
1877. The error was probably originally
perpetrated by Duveneck
himself. Trying to recall whom he had
painted in Innsbruck, he
remembered that his sitter was a leader
in the American women's
movement. Forgetting her name, he or
someone else made the
mistaken assumption that it was Susan B.
Anthony. It is now evident
that an Anthony portrait never existed.
Likewise, the Blackwell
portrait has been completely unknown to
Duveneck scholars.
After her graduation from medical
school, Blackwell had studied in
Europe, and finally settled in New York
City, where she practiced
medicine and founded the New York
Infirmary, a hospital for women
and children. By 1869, however, she had
given up her career in the
United States to return to her native
England. In all probability, the
Blackwell portrait had its inception at
the time of Duveneck's Boston
show in 1875. Dr. Marie Zakrzewska, who
commissioned the work,
was a resident of the city, a former
colleague of Blackwell, and the
founder of the New England Hospital for
Women and Children.
Although there is no documentary
evidence regarding her decision to
commission Duveneck to do the portrait,
it can be inferred that she
was impressed by the artist's work at
the Boston exhibit and decided
that Duveneck would be a suitable artist
to paint Elizabeth Blackwell.
In the meantime, a decision had to be
made regarding where the
portrait would be painted. Blackwell had
been on a grand tour of the
continent since September 1876. By March
1877 she was in Italy, and,
according to the correspondence of her
adopted daughter, Kitty Barry
Blackwell, arrangements for the painting
had been completed:
Aunt B. is to have a life-size
half-length portrait of herself painted in the
Tyrol. Dr. Zack - I can never remember
how to spell her name - has put by
a sum for the purpose, means to have the
painting exhibited in the Boston
Fine Arts Gallery all winter, then keep
it while she lives, bequeathing it, on
her death, to the N. York Infirmary. We
are in correspondence with an Artist
about the picture. I hope it will be
well done - if it be, I shall have photos
taken from it.4
The decision to paint the portrait in
the Tyrol, rather than in Munich,
Duveneck's European base, was due
largely to the artist's increasing
dissatisfaction with his situation in
Germany. In February 1877
Duveneck commented on his discontent in
a letter to his friend John
M. Donaldson. "Munich," he
began,
4. Kitty Barry Blackwell to Alice Stone
Blackwell, March 24, 1877, The Blackwell
Family Papers, Library of Congress.
Original punctuation and spelling have been
retained in this and subsequent
quotations. The Blackwell-Duveneck correspondence
apparently has not
survived.
Frank Duveneck
323
has taken a great change since you left
aspecially among the American boys
.... Munich will be quite deserted from
the older American boys before long.
Chase is very anxious to make a change
and will probably be in Paris by next
summer, I have also an intension of
going to Paris or London by next
summer, Munich is very much plead out in
the way of art there is nothing
done whatever and no pictures bought at
all and I don't know but what I
would do better to get out of Munich as
soon as possible.5
Duveneck did just that. By late spring,
no doubt influenced by the
prospect of the Blackwell commission, he
had decided to summer in
Italy, and proceeded south from Munich,
stopping in Innsbruck,
Austria, to paint the portrait.
Blackwell likewise arrived there in late
April, accompanied by her daughter.
Actual work on the painting began May 2,
1877, as Elizabeth
Blackwell tersely noted in her diary:
"Mr Duvernack began
portrait."6 It is
fortunate that Kitty Barry Blackwell corresponded
frequently with Dr. Blackwell's niece,
Alice Stone Blackwell, for it is
these letters that shed the greatest
light both on Frank Duveneck's
method of painting and the working relationship
between him and his
sitter. By May 8, when Kitty wrote her
first letter to Alice describing
the portrait, substantial progress had
already been made:
The great work is fairly underway. Today
Aunt Bessie is giving her Seventh
Sitting for her portrait to Mr Duverneck
(Aunty encloses a note for Dr Zack
to ask that Mr D's money be sent to
Venezia). It was very odd that, after the
first sitting, when the background was a
dull Indian-red, & Aunty's body was
outlined in a still duller red, her face
white, with only touches of colour where
the shadows were to fall. Mr D has
contrived to give a most agreeable
likeness, with a very marked reminder of
Grandma in it. I never noticed a
likeness to Grandma in Aunty before.
However, the picture looks at present
like a Spirit-photo of Aunt B. Did you
ever see those queer Spirit-photos? If
Aunty departed and I attended a Seance
the medium wd contrive (if she knew
anything of us) to make just such a dim
misty-suggestion of Aunt B. to appear
to me. I think Mr D is clever & I
hope he'll succeed. He is an American -
born in Kentucky. You will be able to
judge results for you will see Aunty
exhibited at the Club & Gallery in
Boston next winter.7
Within a few days it was obvious that
artist and subject had de-
veloped a friendly working relationship,
although Blackwell's mater-
nal interest in Duveneck never
progressed to the point of adoption:
5. Frank Duveneck to John M. Donaldson,
February 17, 1877, The Papers of John
M. Donaldson, Archives of American Art,
Smithsonian Institution. The Papers of
Frank Duveneck at the Archives of
American Art do not contain any material relating
to the portrait.
6. Elizabeth Blackwell, Diary, May 2,
1877, Blackwell Family Papers.
7. Kitty Barry Blackwell to Alice Stone
Blackwell, May 8, 1877, Ibid.
324 OHIO HISTORY
Aunt B is being painted in the next room
& as the light from my door is
unfavorable, it has been shut. The
picture is getting on splendidly & I think
will prove a great success. At any rate
Mr Duveneck is not discontented with
his subject, for he expresses a wish
that he may paint Aunty again & in his
own studio.
Aunty is beginning to take an interest
in Mr D. I think if we remained long
he would be a second case of adoption.
Aunty used to say she should adopt
"six young men." I'll not
allow her to go beyond six at any rate.8
Elizabeth Blackwell's last sitting was
on May 18, and the following
day she treated Duveneck to dinner
before his departure for Venice.
Kitty set down her final thoughts on the
work as well as on Frank
Duveneck in a letter to Alice of May 24:
On the 19th Mr Duveneck finished the
portrait & the same p.m. it was started
on its journey to Boston. It is an
admirable portrait in every way & I think
would always bring Dr. Zack more than
she has paid for it, because it is a real
work of art. You know it is to be
exhibited this Winter at the Fine Arts Club
and later at the Boston Museum. I
withdraw any embargo as to speaking of
the picture. I hope it will be liked and
that it may bring Mr Duveneck other
commissions. If ever you see any notices
in Boston papers about the picture,
please send them to me, that Mr. D may
see them. He is a good artist, but his
general education is very limited. It is
disappointing to find so unusually
clever an Artist speaking bad grammar
& so unpolished in his manners. Aunt
B. has given him some hints which I
think may help him.. . . We gave Mr D.
a dinner to celebrate the great work
being over & afterwards Mr. D. started
for Venice.9
Unfortunately, the haste with which the
painting was sent to the
United States was not to its ultimate
good, as Elizabeth Blackwell
wrote to her friend Barbara Bodichon in
November of 1877:
The large life size portrait for which I
gave up so much time at Innsbruck,
reached Boston with its packing case
quite destroyed, its handsome frame
broken to pieces, and its background
very much damaged. Fortunately no
injury was done to the face or more
delicate parts of the picture, and it has
given great satisfaction, being
considered a fine work of art.10
Here the story of the Blackwell portrait
comes to an abrupt end. A
survey of Boston art exhibit catalogues
and newspaper notices from
1877 to 1880 indicates that the painting
was never exhibited as
planned, its damaged condition probably
militating against this.11
8. Kitty Barry Blackwell to Alice Stone
Blackwell, May 10, 1877, Ibid.
9. Kitty Barry Blackwell to Alice Stone
Blackwell, May 24, 1877, Ibid.
10. Elizabeth Blackwell to Barbara
Bodichon, November 15, 1877. The Elizabeth
Blackwell Collection, Special
Collections, Columbia University Library.
11. Materials consulted include the
collection of exhibit catalogues in the library of
the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, and
such newspapers as the Boston Daily Globe and
the Boston Evening Journal.
Frank Duveneck
325
There are no photographs of the work,
such as Kitty Barry Blackwell
wanted to be made, in the collections of
Blackwell family papers at
the Library of Congress and the
Schlesinger Library at Radcliffe
College. There is no mention of the
portrait in Marie Zakrzewska's
will, and, indeed, no mention of any
bequest to the New York
Infirmary.12 The portrait
does not hang in the halls of the Infirmary,
nor is there any record of its ever
having been there.13
Does the portrait still exist? Are there
other Duveneck paintings,
not to mention those by other artists,
whose existence is noted only in
manuscript collections generally falling
outside the purview of art
historians? Although the portrait itself
may be lost, it is hoped that
this historical identification has been
a useful focal point for
presenting some new insight into the
lives of Elizabeth Blackwell and
Frank Duveneck. Now, someone, find the
portrait!
12. Marie E. Zakrzewska, Will, January
23, 1901 (Docket No. 120708, Suffolk
County Probate Court, Boston, Massachusetts). Since
"pictures" were one of the
categories of items left by Zakrzewska
to her brother-in-law Albert Crouze and his son
Herrman of Brooklyn, New York, it is
possible that the portrait passed into their
hands.
13. John P. DaVanzo, Assistant
Administrator, New York Infirmary, to author,
October 13, 1975.