Portrait Bust of a Child (Solomon Fuller, Jr.)
Item
Title
Portrait Bust of a Child (Solomon Fuller, Jr.)
Date
1914
Medium
Plaster, Paint
Dimensions
18 x 7.6 x 11 in.
Accession Number
2006.313
On View
Danforth Art Museum at Framingham State University Fuller Gallery 204 (Meta Fuller 4, Shelf 3)
Classification
Sculpture
Label
Meta Vaux Warrick Fuller was a multidisciplinary artist who experimented with a variety of styles and materials throughout her seventy-year-long career. She had access to unique opportunities such as studying sculpture in Paris from 1899 to 1902. While abroad, she studied the human form from live models. In Bust of a Young Boy (Solomon Fuller, Jr.), a portrait of her firstborn son, she depicts Solomon Jr. in a naturalistic manner. One wonders if Fuller had her son sit still for hours at a time like the live models she studied in Paris. Although it is realistic, there is an intentional handmade texture throughout the piece, especially in the torso area. At first glance, the painted plaster appears to be bronze. The emotion behind Solomon Jr.’s facial expression is hard to pinpoint.
In 1910, Fuller lost sixteen years worth of work due to a warehouse fire. She sculpted this piece just four years after losing sixteen years of her work. Solomon Jr. was born shortly after the disastrous fire. He is the namesake of his prestigious father, Solomon Carter Fuller, who was the first African American psychiatrist. This transformative period of Meta’s life included adjusting to motherhood and upholding domestic duties whilst pursuing her artistic career. She began sculpting and creating art in her family’s home, as seen in the studio’s recreation. Besides sculpture, her expansive career also included theater design. In spite of obstacles that challenged Fuller’s artistic career, in a 1988 interview her son fondly remembers his mother as a working artist: “Solomon recalled his mother's always being involved in some type of drama. He remembers certain rooms in their Framingham home being "cluttered" with his mother's theatre objects-costumes, props, and the like” (Perkins 1990, 68).
Julie Fox, American Art History, Framingham State University, Spring 2023
In 1910, Fuller lost sixteen years worth of work due to a warehouse fire. She sculpted this piece just four years after losing sixteen years of her work. Solomon Jr. was born shortly after the disastrous fire. He is the namesake of his prestigious father, Solomon Carter Fuller, who was the first African American psychiatrist. This transformative period of Meta’s life included adjusting to motherhood and upholding domestic duties whilst pursuing her artistic career. She began sculpting and creating art in her family’s home, as seen in the studio’s recreation. Besides sculpture, her expansive career also included theater design. In spite of obstacles that challenged Fuller’s artistic career, in a 1988 interview her son fondly remembers his mother as a working artist: “Solomon recalled his mother's always being involved in some type of drama. He remembers certain rooms in their Framingham home being "cluttered" with his mother's theatre objects-costumes, props, and the like” (Perkins 1990, 68).
Julie Fox, American Art History, Framingham State University, Spring 2023
Description
Bust of young boy, from mid-chest up on rectangular base.
Accrual Method
Collection was gifted to the Danforth in 2006. Unfortunately they sat uncatalogued for close to 10 years. It took until an IMLS grant awarded in 2015 through 2016 for this collection to be catalogued and put into the collections database. - Rachel 2021 Alternate Title - The Boy Solomon (Solomon C. Fuller, Jr.) Exhibition History: Danforth's "Meta Vaux Warrick Fuller Special Collection Re-installation", March 2016
Provenance
Gift of the Meta V. W. Fuller Trust Part of the Estate of Meta V. W. Fuller from 1968-2001. In the collection of the Meta V. W. Fuller Trust, 2001-2006
Condition
Good: Overall good condition. Small paint chips: forehead along hairline, top of head, above right eye, below left eye, on left ear, on right shoulder and left upper chest. Additional chips on front of portrait base, along right upper arm edge and back left shoulder.
Credit
Gift of the Meta V. W. Fuller Trust