February 19, 2022 - Robert S. Duncanson

Today on Saturday, February 19, we move from the Forgotten Firsts of football to America’s Forgotten Landscape Artist, Robert S. Duncanson.
Duncanson, the grandson of slaves but son of free African Americans, was part of the Hudson River School group and described as “the greatest landscape painter in the West” and recognized in England and throughout Europe as America’s first internationally renowned African American artist.
When Duncanson was born in the early 1820s in New York, his family was known as skilled carpenters and house painters; the family moved to Michigan when he was young, and he joined the family business, but serving as a tradesman was not his fate.
He copied prints and drew still lifes and portraits, teaching himself fine art, and chose to move to Cincinatti, the Athens of the West, to take advantage of the artistic opportunities and exhibitions.
He initially began as a portrait artist, but then Charles Avery commissioned him to paint a landscape, Cliff Mine, Lake Superior. This commission had two major effects on his life.
First, this job began his lifelong association with abolitionists who supported black artists. Second, it propelled him into landscape painting and connected him with William Sonntag, one of the leading artists in the Hudson River School of landscape painting.
One of his patrons, Nicholas Longworth, one of the richest men in the United States and an abolitionists hired him to paint several large murals in the main hall of his Belmont mansion. Today, we can view those murals in his former home, now known as Taft Museum of Art, in Cincinnati.
This commission was a monumental career boost for Duncanson since Longworth was well-connected and now Duncanson could profit from those connections. He established himself as a member of a community of African American artists, and he was recognized as America’s first internationally renowned African American artist.
Additionally, he connected with the abolitionist movement and donated paintings to help raise funds for abolitionist causes.
Alfred Lord Tennyson’s poem inspired Duncanson’s most famous work, Land of the Lotus Eaters, the largest easel painting of his career which he completed in 1861.
On his European tour, Duncanson visited Tennyson at his home on the Isle of Wight, taking his painting with him
Tennyson praised the painting, telling Duncanson, “Your landscape, is a land in which one loves to wander and linger.”
Sadly, Duncanson’s occupation may have led to his early death. After his return from Europe, he began demonstrating signs of dementia, possibly the result of years of exposure to lead-based paints. In 1872, he suffered a seizure, causing his death.
Art historian Joseph Ketner’s proclaimed that “Duncanson’s progression from a humble house painter to recognition in the arts, signaled the emergence of the African-American artist from a people predominantly relegated to laborers and artisans.” Duncanson demonstrated that the only colors that mattered were on his canvas, not on his skin.