"Francis O. Watts with Bird," 1805 Lorelei's great summer reading list for kids got me thinking about my own summer reading plans. Reading for pleasure should be something I am more intentional about and so why not start during these sweltering months when nothing feels as good as a library book in your lap and an iced tea in your hand? I went through a biography binge not too long ago focusing on artists like Diane Arbus and Joseph Cornell so I've decided to start my warm weather reading with another artist's biography: A Deaf Artist in Early America: The Worlds of John Brewster Jr. by Harlan L. Lane.
John Brewster, Jr. (1766-1854) was a deaf New England painter of portraits. He did portraits of his own family members, other adults and also painted people in pairs, but I like his solitary children. They look serene, yet world-weary. Maybe it's in the seriousness of their eyes or a type of tension in their bodies in having to hold up a rose, a red book, a piece of fruit, a bird by a string.
I'm looking forward to reading this biography and, hey, maybe this will lead to a whole summer of reading without a pencil in my hand, twitching to underline.
"Mary Jane Nowell," 1810-1850
brother-and-sister portraits via nytimes.com
"One Shoe Off," 1810-1850
(image via nytimes)
"Unidentified Boy with Book," 1810
(image via The Florence Griswold Museum)
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