Winding Yarn (Interior of a Nantucket Kitchen)

1872

Eastman Johnson

(American, 1824–1906)

Culture

America

Medium

oil on board

Measurements

Framed: 70.2 x 85.4 x 10.2 cm (27 5/8 x 33 5/8 x 4 in.); Unframed: 37.5 x 54.6 cm (14 3/4 x 21 1/2 in.)

Credit Line

Hinman B. Hurlbut Collection 1915.682

You can copy, modify, and distribute this work, all without asking permission. Learn more about CMA's Open Access Initiative.

Location

207 American Realism

Did You Know?

Eastman Johnson was a cofounder of the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York.

Description

Set in a rustic kitchen on Nantucket Island, Massachusetts, this painting depicts a woman who winds a ball of yarn from a coil looped in the hands of a man sitting across from her at a respectable distance. At the time, winding yarn was a common symbol of courtship that carried humorous overtones of a woman ensnaring her suitor. The second woman in the composition is likely a chaperone. The suitor’s unrefined, open-legged pose, coupled with his rude action of placing his hat on the floor, adds further comic elements that contemporary audiences would have appreciated.