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The Muse of Painting

John La Farge American
1870
On view at The Met Fifth Avenue in Gallery 774
By 1870, La Farge had moved away from his early realistic manner to a more decorative, academic style of easel painting. "The Muse of Painting" synthesizes the different and somewhat contradictory tendencies found in his work at this time. The landscape represents a site that artist painted frequently, the ridge behind Bishop Berkeley's Rock near his farm outside of Newport, Rhode Island. The figure belongs to the mainstream of nineteenth-century ideal painting, representing an allegory of the art of painting. In an odd twist, La Farge depicted the muse as an artist rather than as the inspiratrice of an artist. Her inspiration is the surrounding landscape of Newport, proving that nature is the true muse of painting. The landscape and overall composition are handled in highly decorative manner, mingling carefully observed details with dreamy, evocative colors.

Artwork Details

Object Information
  • Title: The Muse of Painting
  • Artist: John La Farge (American, New York 1835–1910 Providence, Rhode Island)
  • Date: 1870
  • Culture: American
  • Medium: Oil on canvas
  • Dimensions: 49 1/2 x 38 1/4 in. (125.7 x 97.2 cm)
  • Credit Line: Gift of J. Pierpont Morgan and Henry Walters, 1909
  • Object Number: 09.176
  • Curatorial Department: The American Wing

More Artwork

More Artwork
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Noh Dancer, John La Farge American, Wood engraving on Japan tissue
Noh Dancer
John La Farge
ca. 1886
The Nativity, John La Farge American, Wood engraving on Japan tissue
The Nativity
John La Farge
n.d.
Three Saints (Alternate Study for Chapel Windows, Caldwell House, Newport), John La Farge American, Watercolor and gouache on white wove paper mounted on gray pulpboard, with cut-out "mat" of off-white laid paper, American
Three Saints (Alternate Study for Chapel Windows, Caldwell House, Newport)
John La Farge
ca. 1886–87
Scribner's Monthly Illustrated Magazine Midwinter Number: February 1881
John La Farge
Fernand Harvey Lungren
1881
The Wise Men out of the East, John La Farge American, Wood engraving
The Wise Men out of the East
John La Farge
1868

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