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140:"a lady of perhaps thirty years or more, and from Detroit She came to the Academy some years ago to study figure painting by which art she hoped to support herself, her parents I believe being dead. I early recognized her as a very capable person. She had a temperament sensitive to color and form, was grave, earnest, thoughtful, and industrious. She soon surpassed her fellows, and I marked her as one I ought to help in every way...."
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a long stay with Eakins and his wife from
December 6, 1888 to August 12, 1889. Another friend and student of Eakins's, Charles Bregler, later wrote "I recall with pleasure looking on for several hours one afternoon while he (Eakins) was painting in this room that beautiful portrait of Miss Van Buren....No conversation took place, his attention being entirely concentrated on the painting."
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with her left hand, her right hand counterpoised in her lap, holding a fan. For Eakins's biographer John
Wilmerding, the contrast between the arms is noteworthy: one arm is solid and "architectural...suggestive of an unspoken potential for great vitality", and "the anchor of the portrait" that belies the otherwise reflective countenance; the other hand is shadowed and limp. She sits in a
184:-revival chair, a prop that Eakins often used for his studio portraits. It is selectively detailed, so as to support without distracting from Van Buren's figure. Van Buren's dress contains complex passages, composed in part of broad, brilliant pink forms, and of creased light-colored fabric with floral patterns.
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Her body twists "like an overused spring", culminating in the focal point of her head, its anatomical structure exactingly rendered, the broad forehead suggesting the sitter's intellectual presence. She exhibits what one reviewer had already referred to as "an
Eakinsish expression", characteristic of
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After she had ceased studying with Eakins, Van Buren frequently stayed as a guest in his Mount Vernon Street home, and likely posed for the painting during one of her visits to
Philadelphia. Although the painting is dated c. 1891, it is also possible that the portrait could have been painted during
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referred to the painting when he wrote "Discomfort and a grieving inwardness distinguish the best of his (Eakins's) many portraits." The sense of weariness has been interpreted also as a projection of Eakins's personality, especially in the wake of his professional difficulties. As a psychological
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Van Buren's seated figure creates a pyramidal composition, activated by the movement of her head, arms, and torso. Her body is illuminated and given sculptural form by a strong shaft of light coming from the left. Her face is thin and serious, her graying hair pulled back, as she supports her head
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Eakins's helpfulness included unusual methods: he once disrobed privately for Van Buren in order to demonstrate an anatomical point, an action that he characterized as purely professional. Nevertheless, the story was one of numerous controversial incidents used by Eakins's political adversaries to
200:; in 1886 she wrote to Eakins's wife Susan: "I have at last discovered that the trouble with me is in my head it is exhausted by worry or something or other..." The portrait seems to indicate as much. Touching on the picture's melancholy,
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has called it "superb', and written that "Such a painting can hold its own against the best work of any of Eakins's contemporaries, no matter what their country of origin." For
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Van Buren eventually left painting to devote herself to photography. There exist several photographs of her that have been attributed to Eakins or his circle. She established a
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1891 is the date accepted by most scholars, although some have proposed a slightly earlier date based on the recollections of friends of Eakins. Wilmerding. 1993. p. 121
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study, it has been noted that such a profound rendering of a former student is unusual, and that the painting may be seen as a sort of self-portrait.
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his ability to portray "mere thinking without the aid of gesture or attitude." In a letter from his youth, Eakins explained his interest in the:
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was only the second portrait of a woman from outside his family that Eakins showed publicly; at neither the
Philadelphia prelude to the
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Canaday, John: Thomas Eakins; "Familiar truths in clear and beautiful language", Horizon. Volume VI, Number 4, Autumn 1964.
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nor subsequently in
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The painting came into Van Buren's possession, possibly as a gift from the artist, by 1893. In 1927 the
192:"higher class the thinking people and feeling ones who always want to see everything to know more".
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Updike, John: "The Ache in Eakins", Still
Looking: Essays on American Art. Alfred A. Knopf, 2005.
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Wilmerding, John. Thomas Eakins. Washington, DC: Smithsonian
Institution Press, 1993.
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Homer, William Innes: Thomas Eakins: His Life and Art. Abbeville Press, 1992.
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110 cm Ć 81 cm (45 in Ć 32 in)
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William Rush
Carving His Allegorical Figure of the Schuylkill River
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Sewell, Darrel; et al. Thomas Eakins. Yale
University Press, 2001.
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Van Buren was often unwell, and was diagnosed as having
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prompt his dismissal from the Pennsylvania Academy.
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714:Portrait of Mary Adeline Williams
105:painting by the American artist
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602:The Fairman Rogers Four-in-Hand
219:Amelia C. Van Buren with a cat,
95:Portrait of Amelia C. Van Buren
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380:Wilmerding. 1993. pp. 120, 121
262:List of works by Thomas Eakins
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563:Max Schmitt in a Single Scull
252:purchased it from Van Buren.
172:A photograph of Van Buren by
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783:Conservation-restoration of
730:Portrait of Leslie W. Miller
230:World's Columbian Exposition
156:with fellow Eakins student
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812:Portraits by Thomas Eakins
754:William Rush and His Model
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323:Homer. 1992. pp. 167, 176
250:Phillips Memorial Gallery
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16:Painting by Thomas Eakins
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401:Sewell. pp. 260, 278ā281
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111:The Phillips Collection
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772:Susan Macdowell Eakins
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666:Portrait of Maud Cook
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419:Canaday. 1964. p. 95.
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89:Miss Amelia Van Buren
22:Miss Amelia Van Buren
109:(1844ā1916), now in
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371:Updike. 2005. p. 80
234:William Innes Homer
832:Portraits of women
658:The Concert Singer
610:The Writing Master
435:2009-02-28 at the
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791:Eakins Oval
674:The Pianist
605:(1879ā1880)
362:Sewell, 312
305:Sewell, 260
202:John Updike
164:Composition
122: 1856
103: 1891
806:Categories
448:References
244:Provenance
158:Eva Watson
128:Background
64:Dimensions
706:Wrestlers
550:Paintings
209:Reception
433:Archived
256:See also
182:Jacobean
72:Location
765:Related
690:Salutat
618:Arcadia
49:c. 1891
774:(wife)
757:(1908)
749:(1903)
741:(1902)
733:(1901)
725:(1900)
709:(1899)
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693:(1898)
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54:Medium
36:Artist
268:Notes
98:is a
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458:ISBN
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