On Demand Prints from the Maryland State Archives

The Peabody Works on Paper Collection

The Peabody Works on Paper Collection is part of the larger art collection named for George Peabody, founder of the Peabody Institute. Although established in 1857, the Peabody Gallery did not begin to acquire works on art until 1873, when John W. McCoy, one of the institute�s trustees, presented a sculpture, Clytie, by Maryland sculptor William Henry Rinehart. Subsequently, other works were acquired and other prominent collectors from Baltimore began to donate artwork to the Peabody Institute, which, by the end of the nineteenth century, was established as the city�s premier cultural institution. One of the most important collections to be acquired was that of Charles James Madison Eaton, (1808-1893), an original trustee of the Institute and member of the Art Gallery Committee.

Most of the works on paper in the Peabody Collection came to the Institute through Eaton�s bequest in 1893, along with paintings, miniatures, porcelains, and bronzes. They were collected during his travels abroad during the mid-nineteenth century. Eaton�s interests were varied, as evidenced by the broad range of subjects and artists represented in his collection. He developed a habit of identifying each work of art with the name of the city where he purchased it, and the year. Notations such as �Florence 1843� or �Roma 1845� on the lower right bottom of several of the images presented here are in Eaton�s hand. While these markings have led to some confusion as to the provenance of the individual works, they are evidence of the fact that these pieces were collected more as picture postcards for albums than as works of fine art for individual display. Furthermore, rather than being purchased in art galleries, or through professional dealers, works such as these were usually purchased from flea markets and street vendors who targeted the tourist audience.

A portion of the Eaton bequest, including many of the works on paper, was originally collected by another Baltimorean, Robert Gilmor, Jr. (1774-1848), who amassed a major collection over his lifetime ranging from ancient and medieval art to the work of contemporary artists of his time. Gilmor purchased a large number of works on paper during while traveling abroad beginning as early as 1799. At a time when America laced major art museums and few private galleries contained more than family portraits, Gilmor purchased almost one thousand works, including drawings by eighteenth century Italian draughtsmen, French artists, and artists across Europe from the well-known to the unknown. Ranging from rough sketches, to more complete watercolor compositions, these works on paper were kept in albums or portfolios, comprising a �gentleman�s cabinet� of artwork, and demonstrating the collector�s developing connoisseurship.

The images presented here represent only a fraction of the nearly 1100 original works on paper in the Peabody Collection encompassing fanciful, historical, and contemporary subject matter of the seventeenth, eighteenth and nineteenth centuries.