Eastman Johnson: Painting America

One of the most important painters of the 19th century, Eastman Johnson (1824-1906) produced a number of canvases that now stand as icons of American art. Works like his Negro Life at the South (1859), Fiddling His Way (1866). Not at Home (ca. 1873), and The Cranberry Harvest, Island of Nantucket (1880) are remarkable both for their artistic originality and for what they suggest about American culture of the period.This comprehensive volume accompanies the first major museum retrospective devoted to Johnson in more than twenty-five years. Eastman Johnson: Painting America reproduces in color 104 works by Johnson along with 108 black-and-white comparative illustrations, making it the most complete source of reproductions of the artist's work.Providing a comprehensive overview of Johnson's oeuvre within the context of his era, this volume will transform the study of the artist. The two curators and three other distinguished contributors reveal the true scope and diversity of Johnson's American subject matter, notably the thematic originality of his Civil War and Reconstruction imagery.