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Portfolios%20%3D%20%22366%22%20and%20Sort_Artist%20%3D%20%22Powers,%20Asahel%20Lynde%22
Painting
Portrait of a Dark-haired Man Reading the "Genesee Farmer"
possible portrait of Luther Tucker, editor of the "Genesee Farmer"
Asahel Lynde Powers, (Springfield, VT, 1813 - 1843, Olney, IL)
Powers, Asahel Lynde
United States
1813 - 1843
Male
30 x 25 in. (76.2 x 63.5 cm)
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approximate installation dimensions
frame
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without frame
Oil
Oil
ca. 1839
1834
1844
1800-1900, 19th century, by Rochester artists, men, paintings, portraits, views of Rochester & western New York
Painting
The artist of the painting signed the back of the canvas with a flourish “Asahel Powers.” Powers was a self-taught portrait painter who traveled throughout the countryside in search of portrait commissions. Unfortunately, history has lost the name of this dapper gentleman who, we infer by the books and writing cabinet visible behind him, was a learned man of means. His interests and likely profession are further indicated by "The Genesee Farmer" in his hands, a popular journal dedicated to agriculture and horticulture founded in Rochester in 1831.
This portrait broadly tells the story of early Euro-American settlers who were cultivating and living off of the land of the Genesee Valley. It does not capture the story of the Indigenous people who had lived in those lands for hundreds of years prior to the arrival of the European settlers. Coincidentally, this portrait was painted during the infamous Trail of Tears, a brutal upheaval in American history over land rights in which the military forcibly moved over 60,000 Indigenous people (Cherokee, Chickasaw, Choctaw, Muscogee, Osage, and Seminole, including thousands of their Black slaves) to an undesirable stretch of prairie land, now in Oklahoma. During the forced march, many thousands of men, women, and children suffered and died from exposure, disease, and starvation.
[Gallery label text, 2021]
verso, Inscription with signature, sketches of men's heads, and calligraphic "A" in black paint on back of canvas.
See digital images of canvas verso attached to Embark record.
2001.1
item
Memorial Art Gallery
3/27/2001
2001.1DI1
digital image
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http://127.0.0.1:5000/Media/images/2001.1_A6.jpg
negative
4 x 5
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glossy
8 x 10
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2001.1TR1
transparency
full
4 x 5
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2001.1SL1
slide
full
2 x 2
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2001.1DI2
digital image
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http://127.0.0.1:5000/Media/images/2001.1_A1.jpg
Powers back detail.jpg
digital image
Detail
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http://127.0.0.1:5000/Media/images/2001.1_A2.jpg
Powers back detail 2.jpg
digital image
Detail
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http://127.0.0.1:5000/Media/images/2001.1_A3.jpg
Powers back signature.jpg
digital image
Detail
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http://127.0.0.1:5000/Media/images/2001.1_A4.jpg
Powersback1.jpg
digital image
Detail
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http://127.0.0.1:5000/Media/images/2001.1_A5.jpg
7powers1.tif
digital image
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http://127.0.0.1:5000/Media/images/SeeingAmerica/7powers1.tif
7powers2.tif
digital image
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http://127.0.0.1:5000/Media/images/SeeingAmerica/7powers2.tif
7powers3.tif
digital image
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http://127.0.0.1:5000/Media/images/SeeingAmerica/7powers3.tif