Panel for Music Room

1894

John White Alexander American, 1856-1915

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Catalogue Raisonné

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About the Artwork

The similarity between painting and music was one of the great preoccupations of the late nineteenth century. The French Symbolists, English artists such as Albert Moore and Frederick Leighton, and Americans such as Whistler and Thomas Dewing all featured the subject of young women playing instruments and listening to music. Alexander’s rich orchestration of the friezelike composition, with its languid poses, fluid brushwork, and careful color modulation, masterfully evokes their ethereal experience.

Title Panel for Music Room

Artwork Date 1894

Artist John White Alexander

Life Dates 1856-1915

Nationality Please note: Definitions for nationality may vary significantly, depending on chronology and world events. Some definitions include: Belonging to a people having a common origin based on a geography and/or descent and/or tradition and/or culture and/or religion and/or language, or sharing membership in a legally defined nation. American

Culture Please note: Cultures may be defined by the language, customs, religious beliefs, social norms, and material traits of a group. Unknown

Medium Oil on canvas

Dimensions Unframed: 37 × 77 3/4 inches (94 × 197.5 cm) Framed: 50 1/2 × 91 × 4 inches (128.3 × 231.1 × 10.2 cm) weight: 212 lbs.

Classification Paintings

Department American Art before 1950

Credit Founders Society Purchase, Beatrice W. Rogers Fund, Dexter M. Ferry, Jr. Fund, Merrill Fund, and Eleanor and Edsel Ford Exhibition and Acquisition Fund

Accession Number This unique number is assigned to an individual artwork as part of the cataloguing process at the time of entry into the permanent collection. Most frequently, accession numbers begin with the year in which the artwork entered the museum’s holdings. For example, 2008.3 refers to the year of acquisition and notes that it was the 3rd of that year. The DIA has a few additional systems—no longer assigned—that identify specific donors or museum patronage groups. 82.26

Markings

Signed Signed and dated, lower left: J.W.A. 94

Inscriptions Label, on back: Panel for Music Room | (owner) Mrs. John W. Alexander

Provenance

Mrs. John White Alexander

her granddaughter, Irina A. Reed (New York, USA)

Graham Galleries (New York, New York, USA)

1982-present, purchase by the Detroit Institute of Arts (Detroit, Michigan, USA)

For more information on provenance and its important function in the museum, please visit:

Provenance page

Exhibition History

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The exhibition history of a number of objects in our collection only begins after their acquisition by the museum, and may reflect an incomplete record.

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Published References

The Quest for Unity: American Art Between World's Fairs 1876-1893. Exh. cat., Detroit Institute of Arts. Detroit, 1983, no. 27.

Burns, Sarah. "Review of The Quest for Unity: American Art Between World’s Fairs, 1876-1893." Art Journal (Spring 1984): pp.75-76 (ill.).

Springer, Julie Anne. "Art and the Feminine Muse: Women in Interiors by John White Alexander." Women’s Art Journal 6 (Fall/Winter 1985-86): pp. 1-8.

Goley, Mary Ann. "John White Alexander's Panel for Music Room." Bulletin of the DIA 64, 4 (1989): pp. 5-15 (fig. 1).

The Detroit Institute of Arts. A Visitor’s Guide, 1995, p. 74 (ill.).

Moore, Sarah J. John White Alexander and the Construction of National Identity: Cosmopolitan American Art, 1880-1915. Newark, 2003, pp. 52-53 (ill.).

Mazow, Leo G. Storied Strings: The Guitar in American Art. Exh. cat., Virginia Museum of Fine Arts. University Park, 2022, pp.11-13, p. 13 (fig. 1.12).

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Catalogue Raisoneé

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Credit Line for Reproduction

John White Alexander, Panel for Music Room, 1894, oil on canvas. Detroit Institute of Arts, Founders Society Purchase, Beatrice W. Rogers Fund, Dexter M. Ferry, Jr. Fund, et al., 82.26.