Old Tennent Church

Artist Alessandro E. Mario

Period1856

MediumOil on canvas

Dimensions15.6 × 22.75 in. (39.6 × 57.8 cm)

SignedSigned lower right, "E. Mario / -1856-."

ClassificationsLandscapes & Still Life

Credit LineGift of Joseph A. Yard, 1932

Object number141

DescriptionA winter depiction of Old Tennent Church from the southwest, with the 1751 Presbyterian meeting house painted white on its sharp rise surrounded by tombstones within a white-painted rail fence. Large trees in the foreground retain their fall foliage. The snow covered hill in front of the graveyard shows four children on the right enjoying sledding, a couple walking up to the church on the left, and a gentleman with a walking stick and a book under his arm in the center departing from the church. Six other figures are distantly pictured against the graveyard fence. A brilliantly colored, fiery sunset sky containing a few clouds casts its rosy glow over the entire composition.
Curatorial RemarksIn Old Tennent Church, the Russian expatriate painter Alessandro E. Mario explores the theme of outdoor leisure on a winter’s day. The inclusion of adults and children enjoying pleasant pastimes, such as sledding, adds an appealing genre component to the scene, with the architecture serving as a picturesque backdrop. A third of the composition has been devoted to a resplendent sunset sky, suggesting that Mario was more interested in creating a poetic landscape than in documenting the historic church itself. Mario was active as a portrait, landscape, and still-life painter in New York and New Jersey during the mid–1850s and 1860s. Nothing is known about his background and training, although he attained some recognition in the art world, displaying paintings at the annual exhibitions of the National Academy of Design in New York (1868) and the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts in Philadelphia (1868). NotesThe present building of Old Tennent Church in Manalapan Township was begun in 1751 and finished two years later. It is the second meeting house on this site, and the third for the congregation which erected its first house of worship called Old Scots some five miles to the northeast. Old Tennent is one of the best preserved colonial churches in New Jersey, retaining its original high pulpit, pews, large rooster weather vane, and many other interior and exterior details.

Collections