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Mushroom Girl
Haymaker and Sleeping Girl
Mushroom Girl
Thomas Gainsborough (English, 1727–1788)
about 1788
Medium/Technique
Oil on canvas
Dimensions
Overall: 227.3 x 149.9 cm (89 1/2 x 59 in.)
Credit Line
M. Theresa B. Hopkins Fund and Seth K. Sweetser Fund
Accession Number53.2553
CollectionsEurope
ClassificationsPaintings
Pausing at his work, a boyish haymaker gazes toward a young woman; her pale skin and refined clothing suggest she is not a country girl. On one level, this painting speaks of erotic desire, but it also offers a deeper meditation on longing and regret: the young man is separated from the object of his affection by both social class and a fence, and the terrier will soon bark and shatter his reverie. A founding member of the Royal Academy of Arts, Gainsborough reportedly said that portraiture was his profession, while landscape painting was his pleasure. Figure and landscape play equal roles in the large-format pastoral scenes called “fancy pictures” that the artist painted in his life.
Provenance1788, gift of the artist to his nephew, Gainsborough Dupont (b. 1754 - d. 1797); April 1, 1797, Dupont sale, Christie's, London, lot 103, bought in by Crofts [see note 1]; by descent within the family to his nephew, Richard Gainsborough Dupont; June 8, 1872, Dupont sale, Christie's, London, lot 67, to White. By 1891, William Houldsworth, Halifax, Yorkshire; May 23, 1891, Houldsworth sale, Christie's, London, lot 60, to Agnew's, London (stock no. 5987); between 1903 and 1905, sold by Agnew's to Lord James Joicey, 1st Baron Joicey, Chester-Le-Street, Durham [see note 2]; about 1907, sold by Joicey to E.M. Hodgkins, Paris; from Hodgkins to Samuel G. Archibald, Paris and Montreal; March 30, 1951, posthumous Archibald sale, Parke-Bernet, New York, lot 249, to Cecil George 'Mickey' Doward (dealer, b. 1899 - d. 1967), New York for $1,800; October 8, 1953, sold by Cecil George 'Mickey' Doward to Vose Galleries, Boston [see note 3]; 1953, sold by Vose Galleries to the MFA for $15,000. (Accession Date: December 10, 1953)
NOTES:
[1] See The Fifth Volume of the Walpole Society, 1915-16 and 1916-1917, Ed. A.J. Finberg, pg. 96, no. 103 and pg. 98, footnote 1.
[2] See Century of Loan Exhibitions, Agnew's, 1903, no. 21. According to Vose, the work was possibly exhibited by Joicey in London/Glasgow in 1905.
[3] This provenance information comes from documentation provided by Robert G. Vose Jr. to the MFA and oral history given in a lecture by Vose on May 14, 1987 (transcription of talk in the Smithsonian Archives of American Art).
NOTES:
[1] See The Fifth Volume of the Walpole Society, 1915-16 and 1916-1917, Ed. A.J. Finberg, pg. 96, no. 103 and pg. 98, footnote 1.
[2] See Century of Loan Exhibitions, Agnew's, 1903, no. 21. According to Vose, the work was possibly exhibited by Joicey in London/Glasgow in 1905.
[3] This provenance information comes from documentation provided by Robert G. Vose Jr. to the MFA and oral history given in a lecture by Vose on May 14, 1987 (transcription of talk in the Smithsonian Archives of American Art).