A provocative portrait of a family enjoying a picnic perhaps by the Muskingum River in Ohio. Everyone came ---old and young, Negro servants and shy lovers. "The Artist and Her Family at a Fourth of July Picnic", ca. 1864; Originally an oil on canvas that was 49 1/2 x 63 in. and is now in the National Museum of Women in the Arts,
In 1830, the eight-year-old Angélique Marie Martin, called Lilly, arrived in the U.S. from her native England. Her parents, a politically progressive couple of French descent, raised their daughter in the small town of Marietta, Ohio.
When her artistic abilities and ambitions outstripped the cultural resources available there, her father took her to Cincinnati, where she studied with the portrait painter John Insco Williams.
At 22, Lilly Martin married Benjamin Rush Spencer. They made their home first in New York City, then in Newark, New Jersey, and then moved into a large house in Highland, New York, across the Hudson River from Poughkeepsie. The couple had 13 children, seven of whom survived to adulthood.
Lilly was the principal breadwinner, while Benjamin managed their growing household. In the late 1840s and 1850s, the artist’s work became popular in Europe and America.
Spencer exhibited her paintings at the National Academy of Design and was represented at the Women’s Pavilion of the Philadelphia Centennial Exhibition in 1876. She also produced work for a number of prominent patrons. However, much of Spencer’s fame resulted from the widespread sale of inexpensive engraved copies of her oil paintings. The last image is of Lilly Spencer towards the end of her life.
This is an engraving that might have been finished in watercolor? Everything is tinted in various shades of browns and pinks and someone framed it with a pale pink velvet mat. The frame measures 11" in height by 14" wide. The print within the rose colored velvet frame measures 5 1/2" in height by 8 1/2" wide.
