The Ferris Collection of Prints - Introduction
The Museum’s Graphic Arts Collection, the oldest print-collecting unit in the Smithsonian, focuses on the technical and social history of printmaking to document how prints are made and used. Smithsonian art museums collect works on paper selected for aesthetic reasons, but the National Museum of American History (formerly the Museum of History and Technology) takes a broad view of visual culture.
Our prints illustrate technical developments and cultural changes. They represent all kinds of graphic works that have influenced American society. The collection has always included examples from many periods and countries, fine-art prints as well as popular and commercial graphic art, together with the plates, blocks, and tools used to produce prints. In 1996 the Museum presented an exhibition on 150 years of Smithsonian print collecting, Building a National Collection.
One of the largest print collections ever received by the Smithsonian was donated by the Ferris family between 1927 and 1932. Stephen James Ferris (1835–1915), a Philadelphia painter and etcher, collected over 2,000 European and American prints, both reproductive and original, representing old master and contemporary printmakers. The collection incorporated a variety of artistic subjects, compositions, and styles. Ferris may well have mined it for inspiration for his own work, but he was also deeply interested in art for its own sake. He and his family and friends would have simply enjoyed studying the images.
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"The Ferris Collection of Prints - Introduction" showing 5 items.
Officer and Laughing Girl after Vermeer
- Description
- Le Soldat et la Fillette Qui Rit is the only painting by Johannes Vermeer (1632–1675) that Jules Jacquemart etched. His first attempt to etch a painting in 1861 was a failure, as apparently he had been unable to work directly from the subject. Not until five years later in 1866 did he make a second attempt at etching a painting, this print after Vermeer. It was considered to be one of the best reproductive etchings of the time. The Vermeer painting now hangs in the Frick Collection, New York. But when Jacquemart etched it for the Gazette des Beaux-Arts, it was in the collection of Léopold Double, a French artillery officer, bibliophile, and art collector.
- Location
- Currently not on view
- Date made
- 1866
- original artist
- Vermeer, Jan
- graphic artist
- Jacquemart, Jules
- printer
- Delâtre
- publisher
- Gazette des Beaux-Arts
- ID Number
- GA*14601
- catalog number
- 14601
- accession number
- 94830
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center
Farm Scene, the Scourer
- Description
- This impression of La Recureuse by Charles Jacque is neither signed nor dated. The print shows a farm girl washing a large tub, which has been propped up on a rustic stool or wooden chopping block. The young boy, standing and carrying a shield, originally was shown relieving himself. A later hand, possibly Stephen Ferris’s or Gerome Ferris’s, censored the artist’s composition by whiting out the original activity and inking in a shield. Printed on chine colle.
- Location
- Currently not on view
- Date made
- 1845
- graphic artist
- Jacque, Charles Émile
- ID Number
- GA*14705
- catalog number
- 14705
- accession number
- 94830
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center
First Love Letter
- Description
- Camille Piton made this etching to illustrate a catalog for an auction of works from the collection of J. C. Runkle, which was held in New York on March 8, 1883. Samuel P. Avery, art dealer and himself a collector, organized the sale and the catalog. The New York Times judged Piton’s effort as “handsomely etched.” Ludwig Knaus (1829–1910), the original artist of First Love Letter, was a German painter of sentimental genre scenes which were very popular in his day. Originally titled in German, his painting was known by its English title because it had been purchased by an American.
- Location
- Currently not on view
- Date made
- 1879
- original artist
- Knaus, Ludwig
- graphic artist
- Piton, Camille
- ID Number
- GA*14885
- catalog number
- 14885
- accession number
- 94830
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center
Portrait of Two Brothers
- Description
- Les Deux Frères by Louise Girard after a drawing by Paul Delaroche (1797–1856) of the children of Monsieur de la Villestreux is executed in the crayon manner, a process invented in France. Using special tools on a plate covered with an etching ground, the artist reproduces a drawing. When printed on the appropriate paper with the right kinds of inks, the reproduction closely resembles the original chalk drawing. The French firm Rittner & Goupil published this print on August 22, 1835. The original artist, Paul Delaroche, painted history subjects and portraits. In his day, he was a popular artist in the academic tradition, and engravings after his paintings sold very well in Britain and the United States.
- Location
- Currently not on view
- Date made
- 1835
- graphic artist
- Girard, Louise
- original artist
- Delaroche, Paul
- publisher
- Rittner & Goupil
- ID Number
- GA*15249
- catalog number
- 15249
- accession number
- 94830
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center
Man with a Broken Pitcher
- Description
- La Cruche Cassée etched by Charles Jacque shows a seated man with a broken pitcher in his left hand, at which he gestures with his right. Shards from the pitcher lie on the floor, and a basket tilts off the edge of the table, on which sits an empty glass. It appears that Jacque is chronicling the kind of mishap that can befall the drinking man. Before concentrating on depictions of rural life, Jacque made caricatures for a satiric magazine. In his prints, however, he presented the life of rural people sympathetically, not satirically.
- Location
- Currently not on view
- Date made
- 1844
- graphic artist
- Jacque, Charles Émile
- ID Number
- GA*14706
- catalog number
- 14706
- accession number
- 94830
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center