The image shows a seated woman and a standing boy beside her. The woman is sitting on a wooden chair, with her right hand resting on a small table and her left hand holding a small book. She has dark hair styled in an updo and wears a long, dark dress with long sleeves and a pearl necklace. The boy is standing beside her, wearing a dark suit with shiny buttons and a bow tie. In front of them is a table covered with a white tablecloth, holding cakes, cups, a teapot, and a spoon. The background has a green wall with a window showing greenery and flowers outside, framed with a wooden frame. Red drapes with gold accents hang on either side of the window.

Interior Scene

American 19th Century

The image shows a seated woman and a standing boy beside her. The woman is sitting on a wooden chair, with her right hand resting on a small table and her left hand holding a small book. She has dark hair styled in an updo and wears a long, dark dress with long sleeves and a pearl necklace. The boy is standing beside her, wearing a dark suit with shiny buttons and a bow tie. In front of them is a table covered with a white tablecloth, holding cakes, cups, a teapot, and a spoon. The background has a green wall with a window showing greenery and flowers outside, framed with a wooden frame. Red drapes with gold accents hang on either side of the window.

Colors in this work

Details
Artist
American 19th Century
Date
c. 1840
Medium
oil on canvas
Dimensions
overall: 71.1 x 60 cm (28 x 23 5/8 in.) framed: 91.4 x 81.6 x 5.7 cm (36 x 32 1/8 x 2 1/4 in.)
Department
CAB
Holding institution
National Gallery of Art
Palette

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Image provider
national-gallery-of-art
License
CC0-1.0
Credit
Gift of Edgar William and Bernice Chrysler Garbisch

Art Genome Taxonomy

9 tags

Subject Matter

  • Interiors Both · 100%

    The title and catalog description identify an interior scene, and the image shows a furnished room with tables, a chair, curtains, and a window.

  • Human Figure Visual · 99%

    A seated adult woman and a standing boy are the two clearly depicted human figures.

  • Food Both · 98%

    The tables visibly hold cakes or pastries along with cups, a teapot, and other serving objects.

  • Scenes of Everyday Life Both · 86%

    The work presents posed figures within an arranged domestic setting centered on household furniture and a tea service, without a clearly identified historical or ceremonial event.

Visual Qualities

  • Bright and Vivid Colors Visual · 98%

    Saturated red curtains, a vivid green wall, dark blue-black clothing, white tablecloths, and a warm ocher floor dominate the palette.

  • Flatness Visual · 88%

    The space is rendered with simplified forms, shallow depth, and broad relatively flat areas of color, especially in the wall, floor, drapery, and figures.

Medium and Techniques

  • Oil Painting Metadata · 100%

    The catalog specifies oil on canvas.

Time Periods

  • 19th Century Art Metadata · 99%

    The catalog dates the painting to circa 1840, placing it within nineteenth-century art.

Geographic Regions

  • American Art Metadata · 99%

    The National Gallery of Art catalog identifies the work as by “American 19th Century,” an American catalog designation rather than a named artist attribution.

Source & rights

American 19th Century. Interior Scene. Courtesy National Gallery of Art, Washington.

High-resolution sources

Catalog record ↗ Image source ↗ Image license ↗ Image-use terms ↗ Catalog metadata terms ↗

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