On View
On viewObject number2009.109
Boyhood of Lincoln
Artist
Eastman Johnson
(American, 1824-1906)
Date1867
Mediumoil on panel
Dimensionsframe: 35 3/4 × 31 × 4 in. (90.8 × 78.7 × 10.2 cm)
image: 27 × 22 in. (68.6 × 55.9 cm)
image: 27 × 22 in. (68.6 × 55.9 cm)
Credit LineAcquired through the generosity of an anonymous donor
Exhibition History"Rave Reviews: 100 Years of Great American Art," National Academy of Design (Sept. 20 - Dec. 30, 2000).
"Lasting Legacy: A Collection for Kalamazoo," Kalamazoo Institute of Arts, Kalamazoo, Michigan (Sep. 6, 2014 - Jan. 4, 2015).
"Unveiling American Genius," Kalamazoo Institute of Arts, Kalamazoo, MI (Dec. 18, 2020 - present).
"Unveiling American Genius," KIA Permanent Collection Exhibition, Traditional, Markin, Nay and Groos Galleries (March 1, 2021 - December 31, 2023).Label Text"With the tolling tolling bells’ perpetual clang,
Here, coffin that slowly passes,
I give you my sprig of lilac."
Walt Whitman, “When Lilacs Last in the Dooryard Bloom’d,” 1865
In the years following the Civil War and the assassination of Abraham Lincoln, America’s artists and poets often helped the nation mourn. Eastman Johnson’s portrayal of Lincoln may have brought solace by invoking the quintessential American traits that Lincoln embodied—humility, hard work, self-reliance, and a desire for knowledge. This work presents a young Lincoln, who, like the country, glowed with future promise even in early years of hardship and darkness. Completed shortly after Lincoln’s death, Johnson’s painting, like Whitman’s elegy, acknowledged the country’s profound sorrow, but found solace in Lincoln’s heroic persona.
The young Lincoln sits alone in a dim cabin, lit only by firelight. The rustic hearth recalls a humble cabin of Lincoln’s youth, but also symbolizes the warmth of home and peaceful times of a bygone era. Engrossed in his reading, the self-educated boy leans toward the flame—a metaphor for enlightenment and learning.
Eastman Johnson was a successful genre painter, celebrated for his realistic (though often sentimental) scenes of everyday American life. He applied techniques learned while studying abroad in Europe to create sympathetic portrayals of Americans from many different walks of life, from African-American freedmen to Native Americans on the frontier to working class laborers in his native New England. Johnson also completed numerous portraits of prominent American politicians and literary figures, often, as in Boyhood of Lincoln, symbolically representing the honorable character traits for which the individual was revered.
