On View
Not on viewObject number1961/2.287
Checkers up at the Farm
Artist
John Rogers
(American, 1829-1904)
Date1875
Mediumcast plaster
DimensionsOverall: 17 × 21 1/2 × 18 in. (43.2 × 54.6 × 45.7 cm)
Credit LineGift of Mr. and Mrs. J. Stanley Brothers, Jr.
Exhibition History"Artists as Storytellers," KIA Nay Gallery (Feb. 12 - Nov. 10, 2000).
Label TextThough he spent much of his adult life living and working in Rome, Rogers was, at least by some measures, the most popular sculptor of the nineteenth century United States. His typical scenes, sometimes termed “Rogers groups”, tapped into the sentimentality of post-Civil War U.S. culture and became a huge popular success in a way that few other artists could duplicate. In total, he sold nearly 100,000 copies of his various sculptures, often to middle-class families, who were interested in pleasant scenes to use as domestic decorations and able to afford the $15 price (between $400 and $500 today). Rogers made the original models for his sculptures in clay, from which a bronze cast was made, and plaster copies were made from the bronze version. Though he also depicted historical and literary characters and recent events in his sculptures, his most popular works were nostalgic and pleasant genre scenes.
The humorous Checkers Up at the Farm followed the success of an earlier checkers scene, Checker Players, and eventually became Rogers’ second-most popular work, selling 5,000 copies. It pictures a well-heeled, slightly effeminate urbanite, replete with suit, mutton chops, and even a fan, who is on the cusp of being bested at the game by a lowly farmer. In an era of changing economic conditions and transition towards a more urban and industrial economy, a rich city dweller would have been a popular target for gentle mockery. Though he is on the wrong end of the checkers match, the man responds with grace, and the sculpture is therefore mildly humorous rather than a serious social satire.
