Provenance

Robert Schuyler Tompkins

active 1949

Explore Selected Works

Dozens of light-skinned men and women gather around clusters of columns and sandstone-colored buildings that line a crimson-red river to our right in this horizontal painting. The center of the painting is dominated by a structure made up of three rows of three columns each, which hold up a flat-topped roof. A similar structure angles into the distance along the left edge of the painting. The columns of these two structures are carved with bands showing people separated by rings of vertical lines. The capitals are carved with stylized leaves. Just beyond the columns to our left, a blocky, rose-pink structure is carved with more people, seated or standing singly or in pairs. More rectangular, parchment-brown buildings extend into the distance along the water’s edge. The people gathered along the riverbank wear robes and tunics in deep blue or black, bright white, or saturated tones of cobalt blue, ruby red, or shell pink. Standing within the columns of the central structure, a crowned, bearded man wearing an emerald-green robe under a scarlet-red cloak gestures to our right, toward the red river. A woman nearby, wearing lapis blue and also crowned, watches with hands flung up as a person pours red liquid from a bucket. Most of the other people look or gesture toward the river, which winds in deep S-curves from the horizon line, which comes about two-thirds of the way up the composition, through sage-green fields, to the town. A single, white lightning bolt zigzags down from a white cloud in an otherwise navy-blue sky above.
Erastus Salisbury Field, "He Turned Their Waters into Blood", c. 1865/1880, oil on canvas, Gift of Edgar William and Bernice Chrysler Garbisch, 1964.23.3

"He Turned Their Waters into Blood"

Erastus Salisbury Field · c. 1865/1880 · oil on canvas ·  Accession ID  1964.23.3

Erastus Salisbury Field, Leverett Pond, c. 1860/1880, oil on canvas, Gift of Edgar William and Bernice Chrysler Garbisch, 1978.80.5

Leverett Pond

Erastus Salisbury Field · c. 1860/1880 · oil on canvas ·  Accession ID  1978.80.5

American 19th Century, Man Named Hubbard Reading "Boston Atlas", 1843 or after, oil on canvas, Gift of Edgar William and Bernice Chrysler Garbisch, 1978.80.2

Man Named Hubbard Reading "Boston Atlas"

American 19th Century · 1843 or after · oil on canvas ·  Accession ID  1978.80.2

Approximately two dozen people gather around a man standing with his mouth wide open and holding up two objects in a scarlet-red structure on a horse-drawn cart in this horizontal painting. The people appear to all have pale skin and most are men. Near the center of the composition, the man in the cart wears a white robe over a black, high-collared garment and a tall charcoal-gray hat. A hatch on the red structure appears to be open, and he holds up what might be books or pamphlets. A ginger-brown horse stands behind him with its head bowed. In the crowd, the men wear black, brown, gray, dark blue, or olive-green clothing and hats. Two women are to the left. One wears a green gown with a pumpkin-orange shawl and a wide-brimmed bonnet. She faces away from us. She and two men talk near a stand where another man and woman sell food and drink. More people gather around a second stand or structure beyond this, and, in the lower left corner of the painting, a man with white hair and a hooked nose and chin sits by an open cart with a sign reading, “Bear O! Pi Aiggs.” A few men dance and others mill about to the right of the cart. Closer to us, one boy runs toward another as a soldier lies belly-down on the ground, holding a bayoneted rifle out toward a brown dog. The dog crouches with its mouth open. Beyond the dancers and onlookers, a field stretches back to wooded hills. In the field, more than a hundred people stand or march in lines. Lavender-tinged clouds pile up in the blue sky over the horizon, which comes about halfway up this composition.
Charles Henry Granger, Muster Day, 1843 or after, oil on canvas, Gift of Edgar William and Bernice Chrysler Garbisch, 1980.62.32

Muster Day

Charles Henry Granger · 1843 or after · oil on canvas ·  Accession ID  1980.62.32

Erastus Salisbury Field, The Taj Mahal, c. 1860/1880, oil on canvas, Gift of Edgar William and Bernice Chrysler Garbisch, 1978.80.3

The Taj Mahal

Erastus Salisbury Field · c. 1860/1880 · oil on canvas ·  Accession ID  1978.80.3