Portraits Attributed to Zedekiah Belknap
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GUEST:
These are my fourth great-grandparents, and these are their wedding portraits from 1814. And I acquired them from my grandmother's estate.
APPRAISER:
And how long ago was that?
GUEST:
I acquired them about four years ago. They originated in Fitchburg, because that's where the two of them were married, but then their daughter brought them out to Crawfordsville, Indiana, in about 1840. And then from Crawfordsville, they went to Des Moines and Chicago, and then my great-great-grandmother brought them out to Pasadena in 1906.
APPRAISER:
One of the things that I noticed right off the bat when you took them out of the box was that they're both handsome people, and the thing that really got me was the folky nature of the way their faces are painted and some of the characteristics. A folk painter sort of adopts a style and does things a certain way because it works for them, and people like what they paint.
GUEST:
They sat for so long on the mantel of my great-great-grandfather's fireplace in his study and they got kind of sooty, and I looked, I couldn't find a signature, but they need to be cleaned badly, and I often have wondered if it was an itinerant painter or if it was somebody else, I don't know.
APPRAISER:
Most of the portrait painting back in that time period was done by an itinerant painter. It so happens that we think the painter on this is a guy named Zedekiah Belknap. He was born in 1781, he died in the 1850s. He actually graduated from Dartmouth College, was a minister, and then became an itinerant artist I guess because the pay was better for that. The one thing he always did was he painted one side of the nose, and there's always this red outline, and the ears are usually flat and red colored, and he also did the eyes round, and they were very clearly defined. So right now, we would say they're attributed to him. They're so rare, and the reason is that it wasn't cheap to have somebody come out and do that for you. When you got these from the estate, you had to buy them, right?
GUEST:
Yes.
APPRAISER:
And how much did you have to pay?
GUEST:
I paid $2,000 for the pair.
APPRAISER:
He painted on canvas, but he also painted on board, and these are on board.
GUEST:
Yes.
APPRAISER:
I think you would be really surprised with what a light cleaning would do in terms of bringing out more details, but as is, for insurance purposes, I would put $6,000 to $8,000 on the pair.
GUEST:
Very nice, very nice. Regardless of what their cash value is, to have something that's 200 years old from my ancestors is wonderful.
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