The Storyteller of the Camp (Maple Sugar Camp)

Artist Eastman Johnson (American, 1824 - 1906)

Date1861-1866

Mediumoil on board

DimensionsFrame: 27 5/8 x 31 7/8 in. (70.2 x 81 cm) Image: 21 7/8 x 26 1/8 in. (55.6 x 66.4 cm) Canvas: 22 1/2 x 26 3/4 in. (57.2 x 67.9 cm)

SignedE.J.

Credit LineOriginal Purchase Fund from the Mary Reynolds Babcock Foundation, Z. Smith Reynolds Foundation, ARCA, and Anne Cannon Forsyth

CopyrightPublic Domain

Object number1967.2.1

DescriptionEastman Johnson, a native of Maine, returned home every year between 1861 and 1866 to capture the amusing characters who assembled for the annual sugaring off, the practice of tapping the maple trees to produce maple syrup and sugar. This piece may have been a study for a larger work on the topic never completed by the artist. [1] Johnson includes several generations—pretty young girls, a gaunt old woman, a bombastic storyteller, and a boy who drolly imitates the central figure’s self-important bearing. In depicting such diverse characters, the painting suggests the importance of community participation in agricultural activities such as sugaring off, haying, and cornhusking.

Art historian Brian T. Allen has also suggested that the painting has political meaning as well. Painted in the midst of the Civil War, the work references the production of maple sugar, a sweetener that was used in the north as an alternative to southern cane sugar. It thus suggests a northern boycott of cane sugar and other goods produced as a result of slave labor. [2] Johnson, a supporter of efforts to secure emancipation for blacks in the south, would have been sympathetic to this subtle act of political resistance.

Notes:
[1] Brian T. Allen, “Eastman Johnson’s Maple Sugar Paintings,” in American Art Review, Vol. 16, Issue 2 [March/April 2004], pp. 164-169.
[2] Allen, “Eastman Johnson’s Maple Sugar Paintings”.
ProvenanceFrom 1907
G. H. Hall [1]

1967
Hirschl & Adler Galleries, Inc., New York NY. [2]

From 1967
Reynolda House Museum of American Art, Winston-Salem NC, purchased from Hirschl & Adler Galleries, Inc., New York on April 18, 1967. [3]

Notes:
[1] According to a hand-written notation in the Frick Art Reference Library copy of the sales catalogue "Finished Pictures, Studies , and Drawings by the late Eastman Johnson, N.A.," American Art Galleries, 2/27/1907.
[2] See Bill of Sale, Object file.
[3] See note 2.

Exhibition History1971
Reynolda House American Paintings
Hirschl and Adler Galleries, New York NY (1/13/1971-1/31/1971)
Cat. No. 15
For the benefit of the Smith College Scholarship Fund

1972
Eastman Johnson Retrospective Exhibition
Whitney Museum of American Art [organizer], New York NY
Detroit Institute of Arts, Detroit MI
Cincinnati Art Museum, Cincinnati OH
Milwaukee Art Center, Milwaukee WI
Cat. No. 34
(perhaps not all tour locations)

1974
Tradition And Innovation: American Paintings, 1860-1870
Meredith Long and Co., Houston TX (January 1974)
Cat. No. 23
For the benefit of the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston TX (as "The Story Teller of the Camp")

1981
Life in 19th Century America
Terra Museum of American Art, Evanston IL (9/11/1981-11/15/1981)

1990-1992
American Originals, Selections From Reynolda House Museum of American Art
The American Federation of Arts [organizer]
Center for the Fine Arts, Miami FL (9/22/1990-11/18/1990)
Palm Springs Desert Museum, Palm Springs CA (12/16/1990-2/10/1991)
Whitney Museum of American Art, New York NY (3/6/1991-5/11/1991)
Memphis Brooks Museum of Art, Memphis TN (6/2/1991-7/28/1991)
Amon Carter Museum of Western Art, Fort Worth TX (8/17/1991-10/20/1991)
Terra Museum of American Art, Chicago IL (11/17/1991-1/12/1992)
The Gilcrease Museum, Tulsa, OK (3/1/1992-4/26/1992)

1999-2000
Eastman Johnson: Painting America
Brooklyn Museum of Art [organizer], New York NY (10/29/1999-2/6/2000)
San Diego Museum of Art, San Diego CA (2/25/2000-5/21/2000)
Seattle Museum of Art, Seattle WA (6/8/2000-9/10/2000)

2004
Sugaring Off: The Maple Sugar Paintings of Eastman Johnson
Clark Art Institute [organizer], Williamstown MA (1/18/2004-4/18/2004)
The Huntington Library, Art Collections, and Botanical Gardens, San Marino CA (5/11/2004-8/1/2004)

2005
Vanguard Collecting: American Art at Reynolda House
Reynolda House Museum of American Art, Winston-Salem NC (4/2005-8/2005)

2007
Forty Artful Years
Reynolda House Museum of American Art, Winston-Salem NC (6/26/2007- )
Northeast Bedroom

2010
Virtue, Vice, Wisdom, & Folly: The Moralizing Tradition in American Art
Reynolda House Museum of American Art, Winston-Salem NC (9/18/2010-12/31/2010)

2020
Girlhood in American Art
Reynolda Hosue Museum of American Art (10/20/20-3/21/21)

2021
The Voyage of Life: Art, Allegory, and Community Response
Reynolda House Museum of American Art (7/16/2021 - 12/12/2021)

Published ReferencesLassiter, Barbara B. Reynolda House American Paintings. Winston-Salem, NC: Reynolda House, Inc., 1971: 32, illus. 33.

Millhouse, Barbara B. and Robert Workman.American Originals. New York: Abbeville Press Publishers, 1990: 60-1.

Carbone, Teresa A. & Hills, Patricia.Eastman Johnson: Painting America. New York: Brooklyn Museum of Art & Rizzoli International Publications, 1999: 62, illus. 61.

Finished Pictures, Studies, And Drawings By The Late Eastman Johnson, N.A. American Art Galleries, 1907: no. 124.

Look up: Snyder, John. Northern New England Journey. AAA Northern New England, Mar/Apr 2005.

Reynolda House Museum of American Art, Reynolda: Her Muses, Her Stories , with contributions by Martha R. Severens and David Park Curry (Winston-Salem, N.C.: Reynolda House Museum of American Art affiliated with Wake Forest University, 2017). pg. 74-77, 77, 106, 107

Status

Not on view

Collections