Mr. R.J. Reynolds and Nancy Susan Reynolds

Artist Boris Bernhard Gordon (1882 - 1976)

Date1919

Mediumoil on canvas

DimensionsFrame: 55 3/4 x 46 in. (141.6 x 116.8 cm) Canvas: 45 x 35 1/8 in. (114.3 x 89.2 cm)

SignedBoris B. Gordon. N.Y. 1919.

Credit LineReynolda Estate

CopyrightPublic Domain

Object number1966.2.99

DescriptionThis posthumous portrait by Boris Gordon of tobacco magnate R.J. Reynolds (1850–1918) depicts him with his daughter Nancy (1910–1985). [1] While Nancy may have posed for the portrait, Gordon must have used a photograph of Reynolds, who had died the previous year, in order to complete this work. Reynolds is shown wearing wire-framed glasses, an austere black suit, a white collared shirt, and a black tie. His daughter Nancy sits in his lap. She wears a lacy white dress and stockings, and she holds a bouquet of purple wildflowers. Her light brown hair is cut in a bob with straight bangs across her forehead. In contrast to her serious father, she smiles at the viewer. She would have been nine when Gordon painted this work in 1919, but she appears younger.

A 1920 article in the Winston-Salem Journal noted, “On the west wall of the palatial reception room of Mrs. R.J. Reynolds’s beautiful home at Renolda [sic] hangs the crowning effort of the world-famous painter of portraits, Boris Gordon. This painting is of Mrs. Reynolds and her eldest daughter, Mary Katherine Reynolds, and is a companion picture of the one of Mr. R.J. Reynolds and Nancy Susan, which hangs on the east wall, which is also a Boris Gordon portrait.” [2]

In the early 1960s, Charles H. Babcock (1899–1967) gave the house and its contents, presumably including this painting, to the Mary Reynolds Babcock Foundation. The house was then incorporated as a museum and collection—Reynolda House, Inc.—on December 18, 1964, with the signing of the charter at its first board meeting. The museum first opened to the public in September 1965.

Notes:
[1] Various sources disagree about Gordon’s birth date, citing 1882, 1888, and 1890.
[2] Winston Salem Journal, May 22, 1920.
ProvenanceFrom 1964
Reynolda House Museum of American Art, Winston-Salem, NC, acquired in 1964. [1]

Notes:
[1] In the early 1960s Charles H. Babcock (1899-1967) gave the house and its contents to the Mary Reynolds Babcock Foundation. The house was then incorporated as a museum and collection (Reynolda House, Inc.) on December 18, 1964 with the signing of the charter at its first board meeting. The museum first opened to the public in September 1965.
Exhibition History
Published References

Status

Not on view