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Aaron Shikler

Portrait of Mrs. Danforth, 1956

Description

Maker

  • Aaron Shikler, 1922 - 2015, American

Title

Portrait of Mrs. Danforth

Year

1956

Medium

Oil on canvas

Materials/Techniques

Materials

  • oil paint

Supports

  • canvas

Dimensions

84.5 x 64.1 cm (33 3/16 x 25 5/16 inches)

Signature / Inscription / Marks

Signed, LL:Shikler '56

Type

  • Paintings

Credit

Anonymous gift

Object Number

2016.70.2

About

Helen Metcalf Danforth (1887–1984) became president of the Rhode Island School of Design in 1931 and led the board from 1931 to 1965. Under her leadership, RISD became an accredited degree-granting institution with a growing international reputation. Danforth also significantly advanced the growth of the RISD Museum. Her generosity is reflected in more than 2000 objects—everything from ancient sculpture to contemporary art—that were given to the museum or purchased from funds she endowed. These works include numerous French Impressionist and Post-Impressionist paintings and drawings, an area of interest she shared with her husband, orthopedic surgeon Murray S. Danforth.

In 1956, on the recommendation of RISD Museum director John Maxon, Mrs. Danforth commissioned Aaron Shikler, a young New York figural painter, to create her portrait. In a conversation during July 2008, the artist remembered her as “one of the great ladies” he had met over his long career.
The portrait’s intimately scaled format and distinctive composition reflect Shikler’s abiding interest in the 17th-century Dutch painter Jan Vermeer, whose figures are often seated in interiors amid familiar objects. Known today for his portraits of Jacqueline and John F. Kennedy hanging in the White House, Shikler described this sitting with clarity and affection, recalling Danforth’s graciousness and the hospitality she extended at her home on Prospect Street.

Signed, LL:Shikler '56

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Use

The images on this website can enable discovery and collaboration and support new scholarship, and we encourage their use. This object is in Copyright. This object is Portrait of Mrs. Danforth with the accession number of 2016.70.2. To request high-resolution files or new photography, please send an email to imagerequest@risd.edu and include your name and the object's accession number.

Feedback

We view our online collection as a living documents, and our records are frequently revised and enhanced. If you have additional information or have spotted an error, please send feedback to curatorial@risd.edu.

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