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Mother and Son

Thomas Sully American
1840
On view at The Met Fifth Avenue in Gallery 733
This grand, allegorically rich portrait of Sully's daughter Jane Cooper Sully Darley (1807-1877) and her son Francis Thomas Sully Darley (d.1914) has provoked many interpretations, the most ambitious of which equates mother and son with the mythological figure of Penelope, the ideal wife of Odysseus, and Telemachus, her perfect son. Sully filled the composition with attributes of blithe family life: the spray of ivy clinging to the wall is the emblem of a faithful wife; the scene on the urn--Hermes bringing the infant Dionysus to be nurtured by the nymphs--alludes to the duties of motherhood; the boy's foot lightly resting on his dog connotes fidelity and loyalty.

Artwork Details

Object Information
  • Title: Mother and Son
  • Artist: Thomas Sully (American, Horncastle, Lincolnshire 1783–1872 Philadelphia, Pennsylvania)
  • Date: 1840
  • Culture: American
  • Medium: Oil on canvas
  • Dimensions: 57 x 45 3/8 in. (144.8 x 115.3 cm)
  • Credit Line: Bequest of Francis T. S. Darley, 1914
  • Object Number: 14.126.5
  • Curatorial Department: The American Wing

More Artwork

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Hints to Young Painters, and the Process of Portrait-Painting as Practiced by the Late Thomas Sully.
Thomas Sully
J. M. Stoddard & Company
1873
Portrait of a Lady, Thomas Sully American, Watercolor on ivory, American
Portrait of a Lady
Thomas Sully
ca. 1843
Mrs. Thomas Sully (Sarah Annis), Thomas Sully American, Watercolor on ivory, American
Mrs. Thomas Sully (Sarah Annis)
Thomas Sully
ca. 1802
Standing Draped Female Figure; Portrait of a Cleric; Half-length Portrait of a Man; Figures with Wagons and Horses (Napoleon Scene?) (from Sketchbook), Thomas Sully American, Ink, wash, on paper, American
Standing Draped Female Figure; Portrait of a Cleric; Half-length Portrait of a Man; Figures with Wagons and Horses (Napoleon Scene?) (from Sketchbook)
Thomas Sully
1810–20
Composition with Five Figures in Natural Setting, Two Male, Three Female, with a Lyre (Ponnassus?) (from Sketchbook), Thomas Sully American, Ink, wash, on paper, American
Composition with Five Figures in Natural Setting, Two Male, Three Female, with a Lyre (Ponnassus?) (from Sketchbook)
Thomas Sully
1810–20

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