Esther Boardman

Ralph Earl

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

The Connecticut portraits Earl painted after returning from a seven-year stay in England are his greatest works as they combined his natural talents with the lessons he had gleaned from English art of the period. He rendered most of this portrait of Esther Boardman (1762–1851) in deep shades of green and brown to highlight his sitter’s striking face. Her alert gaze suggests intelligence, and her coiffure and wraparound dress, or levite, reveal her to be at the height of fashion, as was her brother, Elijah (whose portrait is also in the Museum's collection; 1979.395). The background shows the town of New Milford, which the Boardman family had been instrumental in settling.

The American Wing

An exhibit at Metropolitan Museum of Art

The American Wing's ever-evolving collection comprises some 20,000 works of art by African American, Euro American, Latin American, and Native American men and women. Ranging from the colonial to early-modern periods, the holdings include painting, sculpture, works on paper, and decorative arts—including furniture, textiles, ceramics, glass, silver, metalwork, jewelry, basketry, quill and bead embroidery—as well as historical interiors and architectural fragments.

Metropolitan Museum of Art