Nineteenth-century American paintings

Magazine Antiques, Jan, 2005 by Lee A. Vedder

Reed's generous patronage of contemporary American artists was exceptional in the early nineteenth century. It was guided by his belief in the critical role of art in the future development of the nation and in the capability of native artists to produce works equal, if not superior, to those of their European forebears. Exhorting American artists, Reed wrote: "Let us make something of ourselves and out of our own materials & we shall then be independent of others. It is all nonsense to say that we have not the materials." (11) It was this expansive vision that also inspired him to make his private art holdings accessible to the public.

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In 1844, eight years after Reed's death, a group of admirers who recognized the value of Reed's collection purchased it to found the New-York Gallery of the Fine Arts. Numerous American artists donated their paintings to the gallery as well, which was conceived as New York's first permanent art collection and the potential nucleus of a national art gallery. In 1858 the collection was given to the New-York Historical Society, where it was put on public view and where it still survives intact. (12) In anticipation of the donation a critic in the Crayon wrote:

The collection of paintings and statuary, formerly known as the New-York
Gallery of the Fine Arts, has at length found a home under the
protective wing of the New-York Historical Society. The city now
possesses a free public gallery of works of art ... [which] grew out of
a collection of paintings formed by one of the noblest friends of Art
... that any country can boast of--that of Luman Reed. (13)

The acquisition of the Luman Reed Collection, together with the other holdings of the New-York Gallery of the Fine Arts, marked the society's emergence as New York's first premier museum of American art.

Two other influential nineteenth-century New York art patrons whose collections advanced the breadth and richness of the society's fine arts holdings are Thomas Jefferson Bryan (1800-1870) and Robert Leighton Stuart (1806-1882). Like Reed before them, they had cultural connections and the financial wherewithal to create a taste for the fine arts among their fellow Americans by collecting and exhibiting works of art. Again, following Reed's lead, their primary motivation was to cultivate a national artistic culture to rival Europe's and, in Stuart's case, to patronize aspiring American artists to encourage a native artistic tradition.

As a member of a wealthy Philadelphia family, Bryan was financially independent and thus free to pursue a passionate lifelong study of art and culture. After attending Harvard University, where he studied law, Bryan moved to Paris sometime after 1829 and spent the next two decades traveling throughout Europe, amassing what became one of the most important nineteenth-century collections of European art in the United States. For him, European artists--especially old masters--were synonymous with culture, education, and prestige. (14)