JOSHUA JOHNSON (American, 1765-1830). PORTRAIT OF ELISHA STANSBURY (1756-1837), circa 1810, oil on canvas - 30 1/4 in. x 22 in. Estimate $10,000-15,000
Joshua Johnson, a freed slave of likely West Indian and French background, is the earliest documented professional African-American painter. He lived and worked in Baltimore from about 1795 to about 1825, painting portraits of members of prominent Baltimore families as well as of other locals. He was largely influenced by the work of Charles Willson Peale, Charles Peale Polk, Rembandt and Raphaelle Peale. According to the exhibition catalogue mentioned below, 'The gentleman shown in this portrait traditionally has been referred to as Elisha Stansbury (1791-1883), the mayor of Baltimore from 1848 to 1850. He married Eliza Eckel, the daughter of Philip P. Eckel of Baltimore, on May 24, 1817, and he would have been only fifteen years old when the portrait was painted, which does not coincide with the apparent age of the subject. It is more likely that the portrait represents the mayor's father, also named Elisha or Elijah Stansbury. He was born in 1756 and died in Baltimore on August 21, 1837. He was a tailor by trade and was married by the Reverend Otterbein on November 1783 to Elizabeth Gorsuch whose family intermarried with the Tysons and Ellicots. 'Stansbury sits in a red upholstered chair ... and holds a letter with mock writing on it in his right hand and has his left arm on a book which rests on the table. PROVENANCE: Descended in the family of the sitter Sold to James McCluskey Private collection EXHIBITED: Baltimore, Maryland, Maryland Historical Society; Williamsburg, Virginia, The Abby Aldrich Rockefeller Folk Art Center; New York, New York, The Whitney Museum of American Art; Stamford, Connecticut, The Whitney Museum of American Art, Branch, Joshua Johnson, Freeman and Early American Portrait Painter, September 26, 1987-November 9, 1988, p. 146, no. 57, (illus. in catalogue).
Lined, scattered craquelure. 1/2 in. vertical raised area at top left edge of back of chair; smaller raised area in upper right; stretcher stress from earlier stretcher; nickel-sized area on sitter''s right proper shoulder appears to have been repaired; paint is thin in some areas, especially in background and jacket; 6 in. area of bloom at right edge above book. UV: Heavy varnish makes possible areas of inpaint difficult to detect.
