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Feb 27, 2012

Aug 13, 2008

The Power of Music

1847

William Sidney Mount

(American, 1807–1868)

America, 19th century

Oil on canvas

Framed: 67 x 78 x 7.5 cm (26 3/8 x 30 11/16 x 2 15/16 in.); Unframed: 43.4 x 53.5 cm (17 1/16 x 21 1/16 in.)

Leonard C. Hanna, Jr. Fund 1991.110

Location

207 American Realism

Did you know?

Mount was an accomplished fiddle player and even patented a new design for the instrument.

Description

Set in rural Long Island before the Civil War, Mount's complex painting presents an African American laborer listening intently to a fiddle tune enjoyed by white men. While a love of music unites the figures in a bond of shared humanity, the two races occupy different spaces--one inside, one outside, both separated by a barn door--effectively symbolizing the pronounced divisions in America at the time.

Video

Inscriptions

Inscription

signed lower left: Wm S. MOUNT. / 1847

Provenance

1991-

The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, Ohio

1990-1991

(James H. Maroney, Jr., Leicester, VT, and Christie's, New York, NY, sold to the Cleveland Museum of Art)

1880-1990

The Century Association, New York, NY ¹

1870-1880

Gideon Lee, Jr. [1824-1894], Carmel, NY?

1859-1870

Mrs. Gideon Lee [d. 1870], Geneva, NY, probably by descent to her stepson, Gideon Lee, Jr. ²

-1859

Charles M. Leupp [1807-1859], New York, NY ³

1847-

Laura (Mrs. Gideon) Lee [1800-1870], Geneva, NY, to her son-in-law, Charles M. Leupp ⁴

Provenance Footnotes

¹The Board of Management meeting minutes from January 8, 1881 confirm that the Century Association purchased the painting in 1880 for $500. Because there are no extant financial records or sales receipts from that time period in the Century Association's archives, the identity of the seller is not recorded. However, it can reasonably be assumed that it was Gideon Lee, Jr., as he was a member of the club and no additional names have been associated with this provenance.

²After Charles Leupp's death in 1859, the painting was returned to Mrs. Lee.

³The circumstances surrounding Leupp's acquisition of this painting, as well as its return to Mrs. Lee, his mother-in-law, after his death are unclear. Leupp,a founder of The Century Association, greatly admired the painting; Mount recalled that in the spring of 1847 Leupp "stood a long time looking at it until I began to think I had made a failure and observed to him, ‘If you think this picture will not suit Mrs. Lee, I will paint her another with pleasure.’ ‘Why man,’ he said, ‘I only wish the picture belonged to me.’” By at least 1856, the painting did go to Leupp; in that year The Crayon listed it as part of his collection.

⁴Although the painting was ostensibly commissioned by Laura Lee, wife of Gideon Lee, a former mayor of New York City, Leupp, her son-in-law, seems to have controlled the commission.

Citations

James Maroney acting for Christie’s, CMA expect notice, Aug. 9, 1991, in CMA curatorial file.

Board of Management Minutes, Jan. 8, 1881, Century Association Archives, New York, NY.

Bruce Robertson, “’The Power of Music’: A Painting by William Sidney Mount,” The Bulletin of the Cleveland Museum of Art 79.2 (Feb. 1992): 38-62.

Bruce Robertson, “’The Power of Music’: A Painting by William Sidney Mount,” The Bulletin of the Cleveland Museum of Art 79.2 (Feb. 1992): 38-62.

"Clubs and Societies." The American Art Review. Vol.2. First Division. Boston: Dana Estes and Charles E. Lauriat, 1881. Mentioned: p.40 www.jstor.org

The Department of Fine Arts, Chicago. World's Columbian Exposition: Revised Catalogue. Exh. Cat. Chicago, IL: W.B. Conkey Co.,1893. Mentioned: p.32

Weitenkampf, Frank. "American Life in American Art." The Century Illustrated Monthly Magazine 79 (November 1920-April 1921). New York, NY: Scribner & Co.; The Century Co, 1920. Mentioned: p.159; Reproduced: p.158

"Mount Homestead Famous Landmark." New York Times, December 25, 1923. Mentioned: p.22

Mather, Frank Jewett, Charles Rufus Morey, and W. J. Henderson. The American Spirit in Art. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1927 Reproduced: p. 40, no. 64

Isham, Samuel, Royal Cortissoz, and Henry Meier. The History of American Painting. New York, NY: Macmillan Co, 1927. Reproduced: p.206

Burroughs, Alan. Limners and Likenesses; Three Centuries of American Painting. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1936. Mentioned: p. 192

American Federation of Arts. Magazine of Art Index 32, nos.1-2 (January-December 1939). Washington, D.C.: American Federation of Arts, 1939. Reproduced: p.330

The Metropolitan Museum of Art. Life in America: A Special Loan Exhibition of Paintings Held During the Period of the New York World's Fair. Exh. Cat. New York, NY: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1939. Mentioned: pp.79-80, no.110 (as "Music Hath Charms"); Reproduced: p.80 libmma.contentdm.oclc.org

Locke, Alain. The Negro in Art; A Pictorial Record of the Negro Artist and of the Negro Theme in Art. Washington, D.C.: Associates in Negro Folk Education, 1940. Reproduced: p.162 (as "Music Hath Charms")

Brooklyn Museum. Catalogue of an Exhibition of Drawings and Paintings by William Sidney Mount 1807-1868. Exh. Cat. New York, NY: Brooklyn Museum, 1942. Mentioned: p.23

Cowdrey, Mary Bartlett, and Hermann Warner Williams. William Sidney Mount, 1807-1868, an American Painter. New York, NY: Pub. for the Metropolitan Museum of Art by Columbia University Press, 1944. Mentioned: pp.21-22; Reproduced: fig.40

"Met Spurs Interest in Mount." New York World-Telegram, February 3, 1945. Reproduced

"William Sidney Mount: Painter Made Long Island His Italy." Life Magazine, July 25, 1945. Reproduced: p.66

Goodrich, Lloyd. "The Study of Nineteenth-Century Art." Art in America 33, no.4 (October 1945). Reproduced: p.223

Suffolk Museum. The Mount Brothers. A Loan Exhibition of Paintings, Sketches, Manuscripts, Memorabilia, Henry Smith Mount, A.N.A., 1802-1841, Shepard Alonzo Mount, N.A., 1804-1868, William Sidney Mount, N.A., 1807-1868. August 23 to September 28, 1947, the Suffolk Museum at Stony Brook, Long Island, New York. [Stony Brook], Long Island, NY: The Museum, 1947. Mentioned: p.45

Larkin, Oliver W. The University Prints, Student Series H: American Art [Painting and Sculpture]. Winchester, MA: University Prints, 1956. Reproduced: p. H 259

Carnegie Institute. American Classics of the Nineteenth Century. Exh. Cat. The Carnegie Institute, Pittsburgh, PA: The Carnegie Institute, 1957. Mentioned: p.16 (unpaginated)

Larkin, Oliver W. Art and Life in America. New York, NY: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1960. Mentioned and reproduced: p.217

Pierson Jr., William H., and Martha Davidson, eds. Arts of the United States: A Pictorial Survey. New York, NY: McGraw-Hill Book Company, Inc., 1960. Reproduced: p.318

Flexner, James Thomas. That Wilder Image: The Painting of America's Native School from Thomas Cole to Winslow Homer. Boston, MA: Little, Brown, 1962. Mentioned: p.32; Reproduced: p.33

Richardson, E. P. A Short History of Painting in America; The Story of 450 Years. New York, NY: Crowell, 1963. Mentioned: p.134 (as "Music Hath Charms")

Bowdoin College. The Portrayal of the Negro in American Painting. Exh. Cat. Brunswick, MA: Bowdoin College Museum of Art, 1964. Mentioned: p.37

Green, Samuel M. American Art, a Historical Survey. New York, NY: Ronald Press, 1966. Mentioned: pp.270-271

McLanathan, Richard B. K. The American Tradition in the Arts. New York, NY: Harcourt, Brace & World, 1968. Mentioned: pp.311-312; Reproduced: p.311

Novak, Barbara. American Painting of the Nineteenth Century: Realism, Idealism, and the American Experience. New York, NY: Praeger, 1969. Reproduced: p. 106; Mentioned: p. 107-108

Prown, Jules David, and Barbara Rose. American Painting: From Its Beginnings to the Armory Show. Geneva, Switzerland: Skira, 1969. Mentioned: pp.82-83

Lynes, Russell. The Art-Makers of Nineteenth-Century America. New York, NY: Atheneum, 1970. Mentioned: p.240 (as "Music Hath Charms")

Flexner, James Thomas. "Fitz Hugh Lane is the hero, American Painting of the Nineteenth Century: Review." New York Times, Jan 25, 1970. Mentioned: p.244

Davidson, Marshall B. The American Heritage History of the Writers' America. New York, NY: American Heritage Pub. Co, 1973 Reproduced: p. 115

Davidson, Marshall B. The American Heritage History of the Artists' America. New York, NY: American Heritage Publishing Co., 1973. Reproduced: p. 115

Finch College, and Robert H. Luck. Twice As Natural: 19th Century American Genre Painting. Exh. Cat. New York, NY: Finch College Museum of Art, 1973. Mentioned: p.17

Hills, Patricia. The Painters' America: Rural and Urban Life, 1810-1910. New York, New York: Praeger, 1974. Mentioned: p.26; Reproduced: p.28

Parry, Ellwood. The Image of the Indian and the Black Man in American Art, 1590-1900. New York, NY: G. Braziller, 1974. Mentioned: p.86

Frankenstein, Alfred V. and Alan Buechner. William Sidney Mount. New York, NY: Harry N. Adams, 1975. Mentioned: pp.30,49,118,152,153,157,(as "force of music"),160,236, 249, 379, 471; Reproduced: p.159, no.56

Adams, Karen M. "The Black Image in the Paintings of William Sidney Mount." The American Art Journal 7, No.2 (November 1975): 42-59. Mentioned: p.49; Reproduced: p.50 www.jstor.org

Taylor, Joshua C. America As Art. Washington D.C: Published for the National Collection of Fine Arts by the Smithsonian Institution Press, 1976. Reproduced: p. 55

Brown, Milton W. American Art to 1900: Painting, Sculpture, Architecture. New York, NY: H.N. Abrams, 1977. Mentioned: p.345 (as "Music Hath Charms"); Reproduced: p.346 (as "Music Hath Charms")

Callow, James T. "American art in the collection of Charles M. Leupp." Antiques 118 (November 1980). Mentioned: p.1003; Reproduced: frontispiece and p.1002

Chirico, Robert. F. "Some Reflections on Sound and Silence in the Visual Arts." Arts Magazine 56, no.8 (April 1982):101-105. Mentioned: pp.102-103, 105; Reproduced: p.102

Cassedy, David C., Gail Shrott, and Janice Gray Armstrong. William Sidney Mount, Annotated Bibliography and Listings of Archival Holdings of the Museums at Stony Brook. Stony Brook, NY: The Museums, 1983 Mentioned: p.28, 65-67; Reproduced: p.67

Martha V. Pike. "Catching the Tune: Music and William Sidney Mount." In Catching the Tune: Music and William Sidney Mount, edited by Janice Gray Armstrong. Stony Brook, NY: The Museums at Stony Brook, 1984. Mentioned: pp.11-12; Reproduced: p.14

Smith, Jessie Carney. Images of Blacks in American Culture: A Reference Guide to Information Sources. New York, NY: Greenwood Press, 1988. Mentioned: p. 23

McElroy, Guy C., Henry Louis Gates, and Christopher C. French. Facing History: The Black Image in American Art, 1710-1940. San Francisco, CA: Bedford Arts, 1990. Mentioned: p.19

Boime, Albert. The Art of Exclusion: Representing Blacks in the Nineteenth Century. Washington D.C.: Smithsonian Institution Press, 1990. Mentioned: pp.92-93; Reproduced: p.91

Glueck, Grace. "The Century Club's Hard Decision to Raise Cash by Selling a Painting." The New York Times, October 20, 1990. Mentioned and reproduced: p.11

Berry, Wendell. Outstanding in the Field: A Catalogue of American Paintings for the Nineties, Hard Times Call for Hard Choices, Plus Some Food for Thought ... an Essay Entitled The Pleasures of Eating, by Wendell Berry. Leicester, VT: James Maroney, Inc, 1991. Mentioned: p.11-13; Reproduced: p.11

Johns, Elizabeth. American Genre Painting: The Politics of Everyday Life. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1991. Mentioned: p.119-123; Reproduced: pl.14

The Century Association. 1991. The Century Yearbook. New York: The Century Association.

Vogel, Carol. "The Art Market: Painting sold for Century's renovation." The New York Times, November 29, 1991. Mentioned and reproduced: p.C30

Cullinan, Helen. "Art museum pays $4 million for 'Music.'" The Plain Dealer, November 30, 1991. Mentioned and reproduced (unpaginated)

Robertson, Bruce. "The Power of Music: A Painting by William Sydney Mount." The Bulletin of The Cleveland Museum of Art 79, no. 2 (February 1992): 38-62. Mentioned: pp.38-62; Reproduced: p.38 www.jstor.org

Turner, Evan H. "Selected 1991 Acquisitions." The Bulletin of the Cleveland Museum of Art 79, no. 2 (1992): 63-83. Mentioned: p. 64-65, 76 www.jstor.org

Bruce Robertson, “’The Power of Music’: A Painting by William Sidney Mount,” The Bulletin of the Cleveland Museum of Art 79.2 (Feb. 1992): 38-62. Mentioned: pp.38-62; Reproduced: front cover and p.38 www.jstor.org

The Cleveland Museum of Art. "Exhibitions: Selected Acquisitions." News & Calendar (Feb.1992). Mentioned and reproduced: p.3 (unpaginated mailer)

Gazette des beaux-arts 119, no.134 (March 1992). Reproduced: p.73

Patterson, Jerry E. "The Grand Acquisitors." Town & Country (August 1992). Mentioned: p.109

Chong, Alan. European & American Painting in the Cleveland Museum of Art: A Summary Catalogue. Cleveland, OH: The Cleveland Museum of Art, 1993. Reproduced: p. 162

Moffatt, Frederick C. "Barnburning and Hunkerism: William Sidney Mount's Power of Music." Winterthur Portfolio 29, no.1 (Spring 1994). Mentioned: pp.19-42; Reproduced: pp.21, 33 journals.uchicago.edu

Fred L. Emerson Gallery, and Whitney Museum of American Art at Philip Morris. The Art of Music: American Paintings & Musical Instruments, 1770-1910: An Exhibition. Clinton, N.Y.: The Gallery, Hamilton College, 1984. Mentioned: p.46; Reproduced: p.47

Gay, Peter. The Naked Heart. The Bourgeois Experience: Victoria to Freud. Vol. IV. New York: NY: W.W. Norton & Company, 1995. Mentioned: pp.11-12; Reproduced (unpaginated)

Christman, Margaret C. S., Alan Fern, and Robert V. Remini. 1846: Portrait of the Nation. Washington, D.C.: Smithsonian Institution Press, 1996. Mentioned: p.159; Reproduced: p.163

Kelly, Franklin, and Robert Wilson Torchia. American Paintings of the Nineteenth Century. Washington D.C.: National Gallery of Art, 1996. Mentioned and reproduced: p.79

Johnson, Deborah J., William Sidney Mount, and Elizabeth Johns. William Sidney Mount: Painter of American Life. New York, NY: American Federation of Arts, 1998. Mentioned: pp.61-62; Reproduced: p.60

Robertson, Bruce. "Who's sitting at the table?: William Sidney Mount's After Dinner 1834." The Yale Journal of Criticism 11, no.1 (1998). Mentioned: pp.108-109; Reproduced: p.107

William Reese Company. Illustrated Americana & American Art. New Haven, CT: Wm Reese Co, 1990. Mentioned and reproduced: item no.60

Davis, John. "Eastman Johnson's Negro Life at the South and Urban Slavery in Washington D.C." The Art Bulletin 80, no.1 (March 1998). Mentioned: p.81; Reproduced: p.82 www.jstor.org

Cotter, Holland. "A Young and Uninnocent America." The New York Times, August 14, 1998. Mentioned: Section E, p.36 nytimes.com

Amon Carter Museum. "Exhibitions. William Sidney Mount: Painter of American Life." Amon Carter Museum Program (September 1998-February 1999). Reproduced: p. 21

Koja, Stephan, and Nicolai Cikovsky. America: The New World in 19th-Century Painting. Munich, Germany: Prestel, 1999. Reproduced: p. 110

Turner, Jane Shoaf. Encyclopedia of American Art Before 1914. New York, NY: Grove's Dictionaries, 1999. Mentioned: p.325

Koja, Stephan, and Nicolai Cikovsky. America, Die Neue Welt in Bildern Des 19. Jahrhunderts. Munich: Prestel, 1999. Reproduced: p.110

Hitchcock, H. Wiley, and Kyle Gann. Music in the United States: A Historical Introduction. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall, 2000. Reproduced: cover

Voorsanger, Catherine Hoover, and John K. Howat. Art and the Empire City: New York, 1825-1861. New York, NY: Metropolitan Museum of Art, 2000. Mentioned: p.209; Reproduced: p.208 books.google.com

Cikovsky, Nicolai. A Connecticut Place: Weir Farm, an American Painter's Rural Retreat. Wilton, Connecticut: Weir Farm Trust in collaboration with the National Park Service, Weir Farm National Historic Site, 2000. Mentioned: pp.49-50; Reproduced: p.49

Cikovsky, Nicolai. A Connecticut Place: Weir Farm, an American Painter's Rural Retreat. Wilton, CT: Weir Farm Trust in collaboration with the National Park Service, Weir Farm National Historic Site, 2000. Mentioned and Reproduced: p.49

May, Sally Ruth, Jane Takac, and Barbara J. Bradley. Knockouts: A Pocket Guide. Cleveland, OH: Cleveland Museum of Art, 2001. Reproduced: p. 48

Kleinman, Craig, Nicholas M. Evans, Scott Gac, and David W. Stowe. Special Issue: Noting the Nation: Words and Music in Nineteenth-Century America. ATQ 16, no. 3. Kingston, RI: University of Rhode Island, 2002. Mentioned: p.143; Reproduced: front cover

Wilmerding, John. Signs of the Artist: Signatures and Self-Expression in American Paintings. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2003. Reproduced: p.80

Craven, Wayne. American Art: History and Culture. New York, NY: McGraw-Hill, 2003. Mentioned: p.225

Chandler, Neal. Silver Apples of the Moon: Art and Poetry. Shaker Heights, OH: Shaker Heights Public Library, 2006. Reproduced: p.66

Muther, Richard. The History of Modern Painting. London, UK: J.M. Dent & Co, 1907 Reproduced: p.291

Novak, Barbara. American Painting of the Nineteenth Century: Realism, Idealism, and the American Experience. Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press, 2007. Mentioned: pp.107-108; Reproduced: p.106

Davies, Penelope J. E., and H. W. Janson. Janson's History of Art: The Western Tradition. Seventh Edition. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Pearson Education, 2007. Mentioned: pp.837-838; Reproduced: p.837

McIntosh, DeCourcy E. "American genre prints in the service of French commerce." Antiques 171, no. 4 (April 2007). Mentioned: pp.104-105; Reproduced: p.105

Greenhill, Jennifer A. "The View from Outside: Rockwell and Race in 1950." American Art 21, no.2 (Summer 2007). Mentioned: pp.73-74; Reproduced: p.73

Adams, Henry. What's American About American Art?: A Gallery Tour in the Cleveland Museum of Art. Cleveland, OH: Cleveland Museum of Art, 2008. Reproduced: p. 12. fig. 13, cover

Yale University, David G. McCullough, Jon Butler, and Helen A. Cooper. Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness: American Art from the Yale University Art Gallery. New Haven, CT: Yale University Art Gallery in association with Yale University Press, 2008. Mentioned: pp.22, 141; Reproduced: p.23

The Cleveland Museum of Art. Cleveland Museum of Art Members Magazine 48 (May/June 2008). Cleveland, OH: The Cleveland Museum of Art, 2008. Mentioned: p.6

Gillespie, Sarah Kate. "The Devil Went Down to Brooklyn: William Moore Davis and the Legend of 'Martense's Lane.'" Magazine Antiques 174, no.5 (November 2008). Mentioned: pp.134-135; Reproduced: p.133

Weinberg, Barbara H., and Carrie Rebora Barratt. American Stories: Paintings of Everyday Life, 1765-1915. New York, NY: Metropolitan Museum of Art, 2009 Mentioned: pp.xiv, 39, 68, 173; Reproduced: pp.xiii, 68

Burns, Sarah, and John Davis. American Art to 1900: A Documentary History. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press, 2009. Mentioned: pp.312,316

Weinberg, H. Barbara, and Carrie Rebora Barratt. "American Stories: Paintings of Everyday Life." American Art Review 21, no.5 (Sept.-Oct. 2009). Mentioned: p.75; Reproduced: p.72

The Metropolitan Museum of Art. "American Stories: Paintings of Everyday Life, 1765-1915: Artist Kara Walker Discusses 'The Power of Music.'" Podcast, November 9, 2009. Mentioned.

Stoodley, Sheila Gibson. "Narrative Paintings of the 18th and 19th Centuries Show How the Lives of Ordinary Americans Were the Stuff of History." Art & Antiques Magazine 33, no.1 (January 2010). Mentioned: pp.68, 71-73; Reproduced: p.66

Cleveland Museum of Art. Cleveland Museum of Art Members Magazine. Cleveland, OH: The Cleveland Museum of Art (March/April 2010). Mentioned and reproduced: p.10 archive.org

Sotheby's (Firm). American Paintings, Drawings & Sculpture. New York: Sotheby's, December 2, 2010. Mentioned: p.34

Marter, Joan M. The Grove Encyclopedia of American Art. Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press, 2011. Mentioned: p.372

Treasures of the Cleveland Museum of Art. London, UK: Scala Books, 2012. Mentioned and reproduced: p. 234-235

Galpin, Amy. Behold, America!: Art of the United States from Three San Diego Museums. San Diego, CA: San Diego Museum of Art, 2012. Mentioned: p.74

Brownlee, Peter John. American Encounters: Genre Painting and Everyday Life. Chicago, IL: Terra Foundation for American Art, 2012. Reproduced: p. 35, fig. 20

Bindman, David and Henry Louis Gates, Jr., eds. The Image of the Black in Western Art, Vol. IV: From the American Revolution to World War I, Part 2: Black Models and White Myths. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2012. Mentioned: pp.73-75; Reproduced: p.73

Cleveland Museum of Art, David Franklin, and C. Griffith Mann. Treasures from the Cleveland Museum of Art. Cleveland, OH: The Cleveland Museum of Art, 2012. Mentioned: p.234; Reproduced: p.235

Brownlee, Peter John, Sarah Burns, Diane Dillon, Daniel Greene, Scott Manning Stevens, and Adam Goodheart. Home Front: Daily Life in the Civil War North. Chicago, IL: The University of Chicago Press, 2013. Mentioned: pp.131-134; Reproduced: p.132

Cleveland Museum of Art. The CMA Companion: A Guide to the Cleveland Museum of Art. Cleveland: Cleveland Museum of Art, 2014. Mentioned and reproduced: P. 47

Davis, John, Jennifer A. Greenhill, and Jason David LaFountain. A Companion to American Art. Malden, MA: Wiley Blackwell, 2015. Mentioned: pp.321, 419

Dini, Jane. Dance: American Art, 1830-1960. Detroit Institute of Arts. New Haven, CT: Distributed by Yale University Press, 2016. Mentioned: pp.46, 49; Reproduced: p.46

Hill, Constance Valis. "In the Eye of the Beholder: The Black Presence in the Art of American Dance." In Dance: American Art, 1830-1960, Jane Dini, ed., 29-49. New Haven; London: Yale University Press. 2016. Mention, p. 46, 49 Reproduced: p. 46, fig. 9

Tani, Ellen Y., and Amanda Cachia. Second Sight: The Paradox of Vision in Contemporary Art. Brunswick, ME: Bowdoin College Museum of Art; New York, NY: Scala Arts & Heritage Publishers Inc., 2018. Mentioned: pp.26-27; Reproduced: p.27

McCree, J. Woodrow. Washington Irving's Critique of American Culture: Sketching a Vision of World Citizenship. 2021. Reproduced: p. 154, fig. 6.1

The Cleveland Museum of Art. "American Painting." Cleveland, OH: The Cleveland Museum of Art, (no date). Mentioned and reproduced: unpaginated brochure

"Exhibition at the National Academy Second Saloon." The Literary World no.18 (June 5, ?). Mentioned: p.419

Berlin, Ira, and Leslie M. Harris, eds. Slavery in New York. New York, NY: The New Press, 2005. Mentioned: pp.165-166; Reproduced: p.162

Kirkpatrick, Katherine, and Vivian Nicholson-Mueller. The Art of William Sidney Mount: Long Island People of Color on Canvas. Charleston, SC : The History Press, 2022. Mentioned: P. 31, 39, 73, 77, 91, 96-97; Reproduced: Plates, back cover, P. 97

Exhibition history

The Force of Music. National Academy, Annual Exhibition, New York, NY (1847).

The Washington Exhibition in Aid of the New York Gallery of the Fine Arts. Art Union Gallery, New York, NY (1853).

Exhibition of the Industry of All Nations in the Picture Gallery of the Crystal Palace. Crystal Palace, New York, NY (1853).

Metropolitan Fair. U.S. Sanitary Commission. New York, NY (1864).

World's Columbian Exposition: Retrospective Exhibit of American Painting. The Art Palace, Chicago, IL (1893).

Centennial Exhibition 1825 - 1925. National Academy of Design, New York, NY (April 1-April 24, 1925); Corcoran Gallery, Washington DC (October 17, 1925 - November 15, 1925); Grand Central Art Galleries, Inc., New York, NY (December 1, 1925-January 3, 1926).

American Genre: The Social Scene in Painting and Prints. Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, NY (March - April 1935).

Life in America. Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, NY (1939).

Exhibition of Drawings and Paintings by William Sidney Mount 1807 - 1868. Brooklyn Museum of Art, Brooklyn, NY (January - March 1942).

A Loan Exhibition of Paintings, Sketches, Manuscripts, Memorabilia (of the Mount Family). Suffolk Museum at Stony Brook, Long Island, NY (1947).

American Classics of the Nineteenth Century. Carnegie Institute of Art, Pittsburgh, PA (October - December 1957).

A Hundred Years Ago. American Federation of the Arts, New York, NY (November 1958 - November 1959).

The Portrayal of the Negro in American Painting. Bowdoin College Museum of Art, Brunswick, ME (1964).

Twice as Natural: 19th Century American Genre. Finch College Art Museum, New York, NY (1974)..

Selected Acquisitions. Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (January 28 - April 26 1992).

William Sidney Mount: American Genre Painter. New-York Historical Society (August 14-October 25, 1998); Frick Art Museum, Pittsburgh, PA (November 20, 1998-January 10, 1999); Amon Carter Museum (February 5-April 4, 1999).

American Stories: Paintings of Everyday Life 1765-1915. The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, NY (organizer) (October 5, 2009-January 24, 2010); Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Los Angeles, CA (February 28-May 23, 2010).

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{{cite web|title=The Power of Music|url=https://clevelandart.org/art/1991.110|author=William Sidney Mount|year=1847|access-date=01 October 2023|publisher=Cleveland Museum of Art}}

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