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The Crawford House with Horses Lady Blanch and Little Fan
The Crawford House with Horses Lady Blanch and Little Fan
The Crawford House with Horses Lady Blanch and Little Fan

The Crawford House with Horses Lady Blanch and Little Fan

Artist
Period1870
MediumOil on canvas with hand colored photographic insert
Dimensions27 × 32.25 in. (68.6 × 81.9 cm)
SignedSigned lower left, "A. Beguin 1870."
ClassificationsLandscapes & Still Life
Credit LineGift of the Estate of Anne Jackson Riker, 1983
Object number1983.9.2
DescriptionLandscape view of a well dressed male standing in front of his house with two horses. He is wearing tan pants, black jacket and vest, white shirt, black tie, and a brown cap. A watch chain and fob hangs from his vest, and he carries a walking stick in his right hand. A gray horse is depicted to the left, and is identified as "Lady Blanche" in writing. A brown horse to the right is named "Little Fan." Two small light brown dogs flank the male. In the background is depicted the Crawford house, a story and a half structure painted white wtih green shutters. The main body of the building faces the road to the left, while a long rear wing extends behind it. The house has two white chimneys, and center and right side entries with columned porches. A small white outbuilding stands to the right of the house. A dirt road ascends a hill along the left edge of the painting. The yard between it and the house is surrounded by a white picket fence. The farm area to the right of the house is separated from the yard by a horizontal board fence. An open carriage stands before the shed on the right edge of the painting. Open fields, some fenced, rise behind the house to a wooded hillside. The face of the male figure is an attached albumen print photograph.
Curatorial RemarksAlfred Eduard Beguin (1834 - 1906) was born in Saint-Légier, Switzerland. He was a student of Marc Gabriel Charles Gleyre and at the Ecole des Beaux-Arts in Paris around 1852. That this artist is the same person who worked in New Jersey two decades later is confirmed by a diary entry of the Rev. Garret Conover Schanck of Marlboro dated 3 September 1870. It reads, "Mr. Beguiss [sic], who has been here more than two weeks, as a Swiss artist, has finished his painting of the big tree and my residence."NotesThe Crawford House stood on the east side of Holmdel-Keyport Road in Holmdel north of its intersection with Crawford's Corner-Everett Road. According to the 1873 Beers atlas of Monmouth County and the 1889 Wolverton atlas of Monmouth County, the property was owned jointly by brothers John B. Crawford (1838 - 1904) and Albro Benton Crawford (1840 - 1888). The male figure at the center of the painting is older than the two brothers would have been in 1870, so it may be their father, William H. Crawford (1809 - 1874). The modest house, dating from the second quarter of the 19th century, stood in recognizable condition into the 1980s. It is now gone. The Holmdel-Keyport Road is depicted on the extreme left edge of the painting passing over a hill.
Collections
ProvenanceThis painting was placed on loan with the Association on 10 October 1961 by Mrs. William C. Riker, then President of the Board of Trustees, to her husband William C. Riker, to their daughter Anne Jackson Riker