Artwork
Jeremiah Belknap
Jeremiah Belknap is an oil painting by the Rococo painting artist Joseph Badger. It dates from 1758 and is held in the collection of the Cleveland Museum of Art.
About this work
Technique & Style
Badger’s technique combines fine brushwork with a restrained palette, producing a lifelike rendering of the subject’s clothing and facial features.
Joseph Badger painted Jeremiah Belknap in 1758 using oil paint on canvas, a standard practice for colonial American portraiture. The work measures 84.0 cm in width by 107.0 cm in height, reflecting the dimensions recorded at the Cleveland Museum of Art. Badger’s technique combines fine brushwork with a restrained palette, producing a lifelike rendering of the subject’s clothing and facial features.
The canvas support remains intact, showing only minor craquelure typical of age, and the surface handling appears stable, preserving the painting’s original color saturation and compositional balance.
History & Provenance
Joseph Badger created the oil-on-canvas portrait of Jeremiah Belknap in 1758 within the United States. The work is currently held in the collection of the Cleveland Museum of Art, where it is cataloged under the accession number 1919.1016. The painting measures 107.0 cm in height and 84.0 cm in width.
While the specific commission details and original ownership chain prior to the museum's acquisition are not detailed in the provided records, the work's inception is firmly dated to the year 1758.
Overview
Joseph Badger’s oil portrait titled “Jeremiah Belknap” was executed in 1758. The work is part of the collection of the Cleveland Museum of Art. It presents a young male figure against a muted brown background, rendered in the modest palette and compositional clarity typical of mid‑eighteenth‑century American portraiture.
Subject & Meaning
The sitter, a boy of presumably affluent origins, stands in a brown coat trimmed with silver buttons, a white shirt and a dark tie, his curly hair framing a calm expression. He holds a small ball in his right hand, while a diminutive dog sits at his side, gazing upward, suggesting a domestic intimacy and the status symbols of youth in a prosperous household.
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Artist & collection
Artist
Joseph Badger was born on March 14, 1707/8, in Charlestown, Massachusetts, the son of Stephen Badger, a tailor, and Mercy Kettell.
