Margaret Fuller

Margaret Fuller

Thomas Hicks, 18 Oct 1823 - 8 Oct 1890

Born Cambridgeport, Massachusetts During an era when few women had professional careers, Margaret Fuller was a prominent journalist, critic, and women’s rights activist known for her pointed commentary. Together with Ralph Waldo Emerson and George Ripley, she edited the Dial, a journal dedicated to advancing the literary and philosophical movement known as Transcendentalism, which stressed the unity of all creation. In 1839, Fuller began a women’s conversation group in Boston that led to her landmark publication, Woman in the Nineteenth Century (1845). Countering contemporary law, Fuller a...

Details

Medium
Oil on canvas
Dimensions
Stretcher: 41.9 x 31.8cm (16 1/2 x 12 1/2"); Frame: 71.1 x 53.3 x 6.4cm (28 x 21 x 2 1/2")
License
CC0-1.0
Credit
Gift of Constance Fuller Threinen, great-granddaughter of Margaret Fuller's brother, the Rev. Arthur Buckminster Fuller, who was a Unitarian minister in Boston, a chaplain in the Civil War, and was killed at the Battle of Fredericksburg in 1862

Art Genome Taxonomy

8 tags

Subject Matter

  • Individual Portrait Both · 99%

    The museum catalog identifies the work as a portrait of Margaret Fuller, and the image presents one principal sitter in a formal seated likeness.

  • A small gondola is identified in the catalog and is visible on the distant water behind the sitter.

  • Waterscapes Both · 86%

    Water occupies the background, and the catalog describes a Venetian palazzo with a gondola in the distance.

  • Haze Both · 87%

    The background is rendered with softened distance and low contrast, while the catalog specifically describes an atmosphere of Venetian gloom.

Visual Qualities

  • Dark Colors Visual · 96%

    Deep browns, blacks, muted greens, and shadowed architectural forms dominate the composition, contrasting with the lighter sitter and dress.

Medium and Techniques

  • Oil Painting Both · 99%

    The museum catalog identifies the medium as oil on canvas, and the image is visibly an oil painting with modeled color and painterly surface handling.

  • Painting Both · 99%

    The catalog classifies the object as a painting, and the supplied image clearly shows a painted canvas work.

Time Periods

  • 19th Century Art Metadata · 99%

    The catalog dates the work to 1848, placing it within the nineteenth century.

Source & rights

Thomas Hicks, 18 Oct 1823 - 8 Oct 1890. Margaret Fuller. Gift of Constance Fuller Threinen, great-granddaughter of Margaret Fuller's brother, the Rev. Arthur Buckminster Fuller, who was a Unitarian minister in Boston, a chaplain in the Civil War, and was killed at the Battle of Fredericksburg in 1862.