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Henry Inman

Portrait of Clara Fisher, 1828

oil on canvas

30 x 25 inches

Gift of Mrs. John E. Fehsenfeld

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Henry Inman was born in New York and apprenticed with John Wesley Jarvis when he was a teenager.  In 1823 he set up his own studio and was instrumental in founding the National Academy of Design.  As vice president of this organization, Inman began receiving portrait commissions from prominent families and government officials.  Inman also painted literary, historical, and genre subjects. Inman’s portrait subjects included such notable figures as Supreme Court Chief Justices John Marshall and Samuel Nelson, John James Audubon, and Martin Van Buren.   After painting a series of Native American portraits, Inman was hired to copy earlier portraits by Charles Bird King for History of Indian Tribes of North America.  

Clara Fisher was relative of Henry Inman through her sister’s marriage to Inman’s brother.  Fisher made her first theater debut in London at the age of six and her New York debut in 1827, the year she came to the United States. According to Fisher’s autobiography, this portrait was completed in 1828 when she was seventeen, the same year a similar portrait was painted by Baltimore artist Chester Harding.  In the IMA’s portrait, Fisher wears a medal which was given to her at the Park Theater in New York City.  The bracelet on her upper arm was solid gold with a large medallion portrait of the English actor George Frederick Cooke, whom her father admired.  Inman painted in a romantic style that emphasized softened contours and restrained brush strokes.

Reference

Carrie Rebora Barratt and William H. Gerdts.  The Art of Henry Inman, Washington, D.C.: The National Portrait Gallery, Smithsonian Institution, 1987.