Newly acquired antique prints and maps or items of particular interest
The AAU is well known today for the thirty-six engravings it published based on the paintings of some of the most luminous names in American art, including George Caleb Bingham, Thomas Cole, F.O.C. Darley, R.C. Woodville, Asher B. Durand and William Sidney Mount. The association is especially important for the seminal role it played in stimulating American art and for spreading an awareness of it throughout the country. With its gallery and thousands of subscribers, the AAU probably had more to do than any other force with the success of many of America’s nineteenth century artists and the popularization of their work. The legacy of the American Art Union is immense, and its prints are an important part of that.
In this print, the AAU itself is held up for examination. Though some controversy surrounded the association’s lottery-style distribution, this print illustrates the open manner in which the drawings were conducted. AAU members fill the auditorium of the Tabernacle, observing a process presided over by various military officers and government officials. After Tompkins H. Matteson produced the drawing of the proceedings, it was lithographed and distributed to AAU Honorary Secretaries as an aid to garnering new subscriptions. That year, new memberships spiked, due at least in part to the appeal of this fine print. $8,500
"Hon. Abraham Lincoln, Republican Candidate For Sixteenth President of the United States." New York: Currier & Ives, 1860. Lithograph. Original hand color. Medium folio. Vignette, ca. 14 3/4 x 12. Some light surface staining. Professionally conserved and very good. C:2894.
A rare and very important political campaign portrait of Lincoln issued by Currier & Ives. Beginning in the 1840s, Currier & Ives issued campaign portraits of political candidates. These prints would have been one of the main way that these candidates could get their images out to the general public and many of these would have been passed around and hung (usually just tacked to the wall) in homes and taverns around the country. So despite the important role they played in the country's history, few of these prints have survived to today. This is a print, showing a beardless Lincoln, from Lincoln's first campaign. Currier & Ives issued a small folio print and also this rarer medium folio image. 3,200
From 1834 to 1907 the firm of Currier and Ives provided for the American people a pictorial history of their country's growth from an agricultural society to an industrialized one. For nearly three quarters of a century the firm provided "Colored Engravings for the People" and in the process, because of the democratic philosophy of the business, became the visual raconteurs of nineteenth century America. Some of the finest artists of the day, Louis Maurer, Thomas Worth, Arthur Fitzwilliam Tait, Frances Flora Bond Palmer, George H. Durrie, Napoleon Sarony, Charles Parsons, and J. E. Butterworth were engaged by the firm to produce a variety of images. The prints were printed in black and white and then the finest colors were applied by hand. These prints, which were issued in small, medium and large folio size, were hung in homes, businesses and public venues all around the country and even overseas. One of the most popular subjects were sporting prints and the most renowned of the Currier & Ives sporting artists was A.F. Tait. Tait's hunting and fishing prints capture this popular nineteenth-century pastime like no other body of work. Tait was himself a sportsman (and he often included himself in his pictures), so the scenes, equipment, animals, and paraphernalia are all accurate and beautifully rendered. This set of four prints are classics of Tait's sporting prints.
A very large and finely detailed panoramic view of Boston. The Smith brothers, Francis, George W., David C., and Benjamin F., grew up in Maine working on their father's farm. By 1846, Francis and George became involved as agents and salesmen for Edwin Whitefield, who had recently started his series of American views. Shortly thereafter, Benjamin also joined Whitefield, possibly helping him with the drawing on some of his prints. In 1849 the Smiths established their own print publishing firm and proceeded to produce some of the most impressive American city views of the nineteenth century, including this lovely image of Boston. This print was drawn by J.W. Hill, with C. Mottram engraving it onto steel. It is interesting to note that though the Smith brothers' views were generally lithographs, this was done as an engraving, and was printed in London. The perspective is convincingly rendered and the detail is excellent. As John Reps says, "the Smith brothers' views achieved a standard that equaled or surpassed the best work of its kind." [Reps, Views and Viewmakers of Urban America p.207] $6,200
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