Floor plan

Style galleriesPaintings of the 19th century

Paintings of the 19th century

Somali Man, by Antonion Zeno Shindler, ca. 1893
In a dance studio, two ballerinas wearing knee-length tutus and ballet slippers sit on a bench and stretch to our right while four more pose at the back of the space, to our left, in this long, horizontal painting. The scene and dancers are loosely painted so many features are indistinct. All the women have light skin and dark brown hair. Each pale, robins’ egg-blue costume has a low-cut, tightly fitting, sleeveless bodice and a full skirt. Dabs of off white, teal, and blue suggest flowers lining the deep U of the neckline at the front and down the back of each bodice. Closest to us and nearly brushing the edges of the lower right corner of the canvas, one dancer sits on the end of a wooden bench and leans down between her legs, her feet widely planted. She rests her torso on an elbow folded onto one knee as she reaches for her left foot, farther from us, with her other hand. Her hair is pulled up and her face, looking downward, is deep in shadow. Sitting behind her on the bench, to our left, a second dancer lifts her right leg, toe pointing, as she pulls on her pale pink tights. Her other leg stretches straight, pointed toe brushing the floor, in front of her. This woman’s hair hangs loose around her shoulders. The pair is brightly lit from a source to our right, and an arched area of electric blue and mustard yellow behind them is difficult to interpret. The floor, which takes up about two-thirds of the composition, is painted with dabs of teal blue, pale fuchsia pink, and caramel brown. It leads us back to the upper left corner of the painting where four more four ballerinas stand in a line. The pair to our left stands with their backs to us, facing the wall with their right legs raised to shoulder height, toes pointed. The pair to our right faces us. They also stand with their right legs raised, creating a wide angle with their standing legs. All four ballerinas bend their arms gently at the elbow, and some tip their heads toward the raised legs. The rightmost dancer is illuminated by a pair of French doors at the back corner, at the top center of the painting. The wall behind the bench is streaked with mint green over honey brown, and the wall at the back of the room is leather brown. The visible, soft brushstrokes give the image a blurred, ethereal appearance in the dimmed studio. The artist signed the painting in the lower left corner, “Degas.”
A leafless, ash-white tree trunk has fallen from a broken stump into the wide V of a neighboring tree at the edge of a body of water near a verdant forest in this horizontal landscape painting. The fallen trunk creates a diagonal from near the lower left corner to the upper right. As it fell, it sheared off a substantial branch from a neighboring tree with a dark trunk. The bark where the damaged branch has pulled away is honey-orange, the same color as the leaves at the canopy, which has been pinned under the fallen trunk. Trees, vines, and other vegetation fill the space around and beyond this pair. In the lower right corner of the painting, vines grow over a broken stump, which deep in shadow. Between the stump and fallen tree, the peanut-brown surface of the water is smooth. Tiny in scale beneath the fallen tree and easily overlooked, there are two men and a dog in a boat. One man stands at the back of the boat and pushes it along with a long pole. He wears a tall, brown, cloth hat, a white shirt rolled up to the elbows under a blue vest, and loose-fitting pants. A second man wears a flat-topped, white hat with a black brim, a long, forest-green jacket, and tight-fitting slate-blue pants. He braces a rifle against one shoulder and shoots into the forest. The dog is white with brown spots, and it stands with its front paws on the edge of the boat, presumably ready to spring after the target. A patch of blue sky with puffy white clouds is seen above the trees in the upper left corner. The artist signed and dated the work in the lower right corner: “H. Vernet Rome 1833.”
Senator Thomas Hart Benton, by Matthew Harris Jouett, 1820s
The Knapp Children, by Samuel Lovett Waldo, ca. 1833–34
A work made of oil on canvas.

The works in this room are listed below.

Works in this room

Paintings made in the 19th century, from every museum.

Section 1, north wall

  1. Somali Man, by Antonion Zeno Shindler, ca. 1893
    Somali ManAntonion Zeno Shindler, ca. 1893Courtesy of the Smithsonian American Art Museum
  2. In a dance studio, two ballerinas wearing knee-length tutus and ballet slippers sit on a bench and stretch to our right while four more pose at the back of the space, to our left, in this long, horizontal painting. The scene and dancers are loosely painted so many features are indistinct. All the women have light skin and dark brown hair. Each pale, robins’ egg-blue costume has a low-cut, tightly fitting, sleeveless bodice and a full skirt. Dabs of off white, teal, and blue suggest flowers lining the deep U of the neckline at the front and down the back of each bodice. Closest to us and nearly brushing the edges of the lower right corner of the canvas, one dancer sits on the end of a wooden bench and leans down between her legs, her feet widely planted. She rests her torso on an elbow folded onto one knee as she reaches for her left foot, farther from us, with her other hand. Her hair is pulled up and her face, looking downward, is deep in shadow. Sitting behind her on the bench, to our left, a second dancer lifts her right leg, toe pointing, as she pulls on her pale pink tights. Her other leg stretches straight, pointed toe brushing the floor, in front of her. This woman’s hair hangs loose around her shoulders. The pair is brightly lit from a source to our right, and an arched area of electric blue and mustard yellow behind them is difficult to interpret. The floor, which takes up about two-thirds of the composition, is painted with dabs of teal blue, pale fuchsia pink, and caramel brown. It leads us back to the upper left corner of the painting where four more four ballerinas stand in a line. The pair to our left stands with their backs to us, facing the wall with their right legs raised to shoulder height, toes pointed. The pair to our right faces us. They also stand with their right legs raised, creating a wide angle with their standing legs. All four ballerinas bend their arms gently at the elbow, and some tip their heads toward the raised legs. The rightmost dancer is illuminated by a pair of French doors at the back corner, at the top center of the painting. The wall behind the bench is streaked with mint green over honey brown, and the wall at the back of the room is leather brown. The visible, soft brushstrokes give the image a blurred, ethereal appearance in the dimmed studio. The artist signed the painting in the lower left corner, “Degas.”
    Before the BalletEdgar Degas, 1890/1892Courtesy National Gallery of Art, Washington
  3. A leafless, ash-white tree trunk has fallen from a broken stump into the wide V of a neighboring tree at the edge of a body of water near a verdant forest in this horizontal landscape painting. The fallen trunk creates a diagonal from near the lower left corner to the upper right. As it fell, it sheared off a substantial branch from a neighboring tree with a dark trunk. The bark where the damaged branch has pulled away is honey-orange, the same color as the leaves at the canopy, which has been pinned under the fallen trunk. Trees, vines, and other vegetation fill the space around and beyond this pair. In the lower right corner of the painting, vines grow over a broken stump, which deep in shadow. Between the stump and fallen tree, the peanut-brown surface of the water is smooth. Tiny in scale beneath the fallen tree and easily overlooked, there are two men and a dog in a boat. One man stands at the back of the boat and pushes it along with a long pole. He wears a tall, brown, cloth hat, a white shirt rolled up to the elbows under a blue vest, and loose-fitting pants. A second man wears a flat-topped, white hat with a black brim, a long, forest-green jacket, and tight-fitting slate-blue pants. He braces a rifle against one shoulder and shoots into the forest. The dog is white with brown spots, and it stands with its front paws on the edge of the boat, presumably ready to spring after the target. A patch of blue sky with puffy white clouds is seen above the trees in the upper left corner. The artist signed and dated the work in the lower right corner: “H. Vernet Rome 1833.”
    Hunting in the Pontine MarshesHorace Vernet, 1833Courtesy National Gallery of Art, Washington

Section 1, south wall

  1. Senator Thomas Hart Benton, by Matthew Harris Jouett, 1820s
    Senator Thomas Hart BentonMatthew Harris Jouett, 1820sCourtesy of the Cleveland Museum of Art
  2. The Knapp Children, by Samuel Lovett Waldo, ca. 1833–34
    The Knapp ChildrenSamuel Lovett Waldo, ca. 1833–34Courtesy of The Metropolitan Museum of Art
  3. A work made of oil on canvas.
    A Woman at the Élysée Montmartre (Femme à l’Élysée Montmartre)Louis Anquetin, 1888Courtesy of the Art Institute of Chicago

Section 2, south wall

  1. Repose, by John White Alexander, 1895
    ReposeJohn White Alexander, 1895Courtesy of The Metropolitan Museum of Art
  2. Artist: Charles Loring Elliott, Sitter: Samuel Putnam Avery, Current owner: National Portrait Gallery, Smithsonian Institution
    Samuel Putnam AveryCharles Loring Elliott, 1863Courtesy of the National Portrait Gallery, Smithsonian Institution
  3. The Sea, by Edward Moran, 1870
    The SeaEdward Moran, 1870Courtesy of the Smithsonian American Art Museum

Section 2, north wall

  1. The Aegean Sea, by Frederic Edwin Church, ca. 1877
    The Aegean SeaFrederic Edwin Church, ca. 1877Courtesy of The Metropolitan Museum of Art
  2. This painting shows a maritime landscape with an expansive view of the ocean and sky. The horizon is positioned in the lower third of the composition, meeting a clear sky with soft, diffused clouds. Two ships appear to be engaged in a conflict on the green, wave-filled water. One large sailing ship with fully extended sails is near the bottom right corner of the painting. It has two tall masts and multiple white sails, and it flies the flag of the U.S.A in several places. The body of this ship is gray with a wide white stripe, and cannons stick out of small holes across the ship. Small people climb on ropes up into the sails, which are covered in small white and gray dots, perhaps indicating holes. Another ship is visible in the distance on the left side of the painting, and its cannons appear to be firing, with bursts of yellow flame and smoke drifting across the water. This ship flies several flags in shades of red, blue, and white. In the background, the faint gray silhouettes of other ships can be seen across the water. The ocean is depicted with smooth brushstrokes in shades of green and white, and the wide sky is a gradient, with light blue at the top and pale yellow towards the horizon. Faint white clouds drift in the top left corner of the painting.
    The United States Frigate "President" Engaging the British Squadron, 1815Fitz Henry Lane, 1850Courtesy National Gallery of Art, Washington
  3. Musidora, by Thomas Sully, 1813–35
    MusidoraThomas Sully, 1813–35Courtesy of The Metropolitan Museum of Art

Section 3, north wall

  1. Artist: Rembrandt Peale, Sitter: George Washington, Current owner: National Portrait Gallery, Smithsonian Institution
    George Washington (Porthole type)Rembrandt Peale, c. 1853Courtesy of the National Portrait Gallery, Smithsonian Institution
  2. We look out onto a landscape with low, grassy hills to the left, a lake to the right, and a brick building in the center distance below a sky filled with towering white clouds in this horizontal painting. A wooden fence closer to us crosses the landscape from the lower left corner and disappears where the land slopes down to meet the water at the center of the painting. Several black and white cows graze in the field beyond the fence to our left. Two men in a wooden boat pull in nets on the lake to our right near a pair of swans. The lake crosses the composition in the near distance, disappearing into a culvert farther back. A donkey pulls a small carriage with two people near a bridge that crosses the lake in the distance to our left. The brick manor house is visible through a break in the full, deep green trees that line the horizon, which comes halfway up the composition. The clouds cast noticeable shadows in the brightly sunlit scene.
    Wivenhoe Park, EssexJohn Constable, 1816Courtesy National Gallery of Art, Washington

Section 3, south wall

  1. The painting depicts a landscape with a field, trees, and a dramatic cloudy sky. Grass, rocks, and a group of large trees are visible in the center of the composition. Below the trees, there is a small shape that could be a person looking up. Farther back, there are some small triangular structures that might be houses. The brushstrokes are expressive and not much detail is visible in the smaller shapes. The grass and foliage are painted in earthy tones of brown, orange, and green, while the sky is blue with areas of thick gray and white clouds.
    The Old OakJules Dupré, c. 1870Courtesy National Gallery of Art, Washington
  2. Diana and Actaeon (Diana Surprised in Her Bath), by Jean Baptiste Camille Corot, 1836
    Diana and Actaeon (Diana Surprised in Her Bath)Jean Baptiste Camille Corot, 1836Courtesy of The Metropolitan Museum of Art