Paintings Worth Looking At

In which a name is more than it seems. Recently, I found myself wandering through the expansive Massachusetts Five Colleges Database. I punched in a search for “Portrait,” just to see what happened. Nearly 4500 records were found ; I paged through every single one of them. (Yes, really. Some, I'm afraid, are better than others.) This appealing portrait quickly became one of my favorites. Painted by the folk portraiture master Joseph Goodhue Chandler, it depicts Mary Lyon (1797-1849), the pioneering female educator and founder of Mount Holyoke College. It’s a very likable image, full of warmth and sincerity alongside that classic New England austerity. (Thanks to Emily Wood, assistant Curator of Mount Holyoke College Art Museum in South Hadley, MA), for the high-resolution images of both paintings, and for additional context and information!)

(Author’s note: This hefty chunk of research dates back to July, but was delayed. Certain materials are still absent. So the mystery's a bit inconclusive, but the rest is perfectly readable.) Let’s start with the theft. Or maybe it was a gift. It could’ve been a perfectly legitimate off-the-record sale, or a simple mishap. Maybe it simply fell off the wall, landed in someone’s pocket by mistake, and walked out on its own, with everyone else none the wiser. Who are we to say, centuries later? All we can say is that, from 1732 to 1915, the Anthony Van Dyck painting of Dr. Baldwin Hamey, Junior, disappeared from the record entirely.