Working from his home in Manchester, Massachusetts, Hopkinson spent summers painting by the ocean, often using family members and the picturesque surrounding landscape as inspirations for his oils and watercolors. Hopkinson’s five daughters, Harriot (Happy), Mary (Maly), Isabella (Ibby), Elinor (Elly) and Joan, and later his grandchildren, modeled for numerous paintings during their childhood, many of which were exhibited at Vose Galleries’ 1991, 2001 and 2013 solo exhibitions. 

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Portrait of Isabella was included in the gallery’s 1991 show and features his middle daughter posing dutifully for her father, her steady gaze and proper posture belying her young age. The gestural treatment of her hands may be the only hint of impatience. In a 1991 interview with Vose Galleries, Isabella recalled these portrait sessions:

“When I was little, I thought all children had artist fathers, and every child had to sit still while fathers painted them. One or another of us five daughters certainly did, quite often; and Mother would help by reading aloud during the sitting.”[1]

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[1] Isabella Hopkinson Halsted, May 24, 1991, interview with Anne W. Schmoll (Vose Galleries archives)

Provenance:

Estate of the artist to collection of his granddaughter, Amherst, Massachusetts
With Vose Galleries, Boston, inventory no. CH-07C, July 1991
To private collection, Columbus, Ohio, February 1992 to present

Labels:

1. Charles Hopkinson estate stamp
2. Previous Vose Galleries label, no. CH-07C

Exhibitions:

Charles Hopkinson, N.A. (1869-1962): Moods and Moments, Vose Galleries, Boston, October 2 – December, 1991