Daybreak. Leather-stocking's Expedient (Episode from James Fenimore Cooper's "The Prairie")

Object Number: 
1947.558
Date: 
1830s-40s
Medium: 
Watercolor, black ink, gouache, and glazing over graphite on paper laid on gray card
Dimensions: 
Overall: 8 3/8 x 13 5/8 in. (21.3 x 34.6 cm)
Marks: 
signed: lower right: "G. Harvey" inscription: above picture: "Day Break" inscription: below picture: "Leatherstocking's expedient, vide Cooper's Prairie, chr. 6, vl. 2"
Inscriptions: 
Signed at lower left of center in black ink: "G. HARVEY"; card inscribed above in brown watercolor: "DAY BREAK."; below: "LEATHERSTOCKING'S expedient vide COOPER'S PRAIRIE chr:6 vl.2"
Gallery Label: 
This watercolor is one of Harvey's different epochs of the day, ca. 1830s-40s. The artist's subject is taken from James Fenimore Cooper's novel, The Prarie, 1827, in which Hawkeye, or Deerslayer, or Leather Stocking sets a trans-Mississippi prairie aflame to escape a band of Sioux Indians who were attempting to encircle his party and had set another prairie fire seen in the distance.
Bibliography: 
Olson, Roberta J. M. "George Harvey's Anglo-American atmospheric landscapes." The Magazine Antiques 174 (2008): 112-121.
Credit Line: 
Gift of Charles E. Dunlap
Due to ongoing research, information about this object is subject to change.
Creative: Tronvig Group