EDWIN LORD WEEKS
American, 1849–1903
Persian Family Crossing the Desert
Signed E. L. Weeks
Oil on canvas
32 x 39½ inches (81.3 x 100.4 cm)
Framed: 39½ x 47 inches (100.4 x 119.5 cm)
Painted circa 1892. The subject of this work is described in the catalogue of the artist's estate sale: "Here we have a Persian family on a journey from one place to another. The father walks along, holding the mule by the bridle, while the mother is mounted on a native saddle and bears in her arms the child. Behind follows a mule laden with their baggage. Other travellers follow. The walls of an old town loom up in the background." Weeks painted the same Persian family in his Persian Mother and Child (oil on board, 12 x 19 inches), a work painted en grisaille for publication as a print and illustration for his 1893 article for Harper's Magazine.
Provenance
Estate of Edwin Lord Weeks (sale, American Art Galleries, New York, March 17, 1905, lot 214, as A Persian Holy Family)
Sale, Sotheby Parke Bernet, New York, June 19, 1981, lot 122, illustrated Private Collection, Texas (acquired from the above, until the present)
Literature
cf. Edwin Lord Weeks, From the Black Sea through Persia and India, London and New York, 1895, p. 45, for illustration of the related painting Persian Mother and Child
P.O.R.