Artist/Maker

Morse, Samuel F. B.

Place Made

Date Made

1818-1822

Medium

oil on canvas

Dimensions

HOA: 31 1/2″; WOA: 26 1/2″

Accession Number

2108

Description

DESCRIPTION: Painting, oil on canvas, of lady facing quarter right, and wearing a frilled cap, seated in a red upholstered chair against a dark lavender curtain at a window showing sky and water in background.

SITTER: Ann (Simons) Ball (1776-1840) and her husband, John Ball, Jr.(1760-1817) lived at Comingtee Plantation, one of the many Ball plantations, thirty miles north of Charleston. The name Comingtee is derived from the location on the western branch of the Cooper River, which divides into two branches, eastern and western in the shape of the letter, “T”. The plantation stood on a small peninsula and Captain Coming, the first owner, named his home “Coming’s Tee,” later called “Comingtee.”

Artist Biography

ARTIST: Samuel Finley Breeze Morse was the son of Jedidiah Morse, the “father of American Geography.” He was born in Charlestown, Massachusetts. He attended Yale College where he was interested in experiments with electricity. Early in life he enjoyed drawing, and during his junior year, he started doing portaits for pocket money. By his senior year, he found satisfaction in painting because he was not the best student academically. During this time, Morse met Washington Allston and tried to persuade his parents to allow him to accompany Allston to England for study in the art. By 1811, his parents relented, and Morse sailed for London where he met and studied under Benjamin West. By 1815 he returned to America where he spent the next few years painting portaits in New England and Charleston, South Carolina. In 1818 he wintered in Charleston with his uncle, Dr. Finley Breeze. Morse was a success, supposedly doing fifty-three portaits during the winter. He returned to Charleston for several winters afterwards to do more portaits. In 1823, Morse settled in New York, and three years later he was a leader in the formation of the National Academy of Design of which he was the first president. From 1829 to 1833, Morse went to Europe. Morse devoted increasingly less time to his painting after he returned to New York during the 1840s when he became interested in experimentation with the daguerrotype and later in the telegraph. He died in New York. Morse is most famous for his invention of the telegraph and co-founder of the Morse code.

Credit Line

Gift of Frank L. Horton