Description:
Jane Anthony Davis (September 2, 1821 – April 1855) was an American artist. Until 1981 she was known only as J. A. Davis. Davis was born Jane Anthony in Warwick, Rhode Island, the daughter of Giles and Sara Robinson Greene Anthony. For a short while in 1838 she attended the Warren Ladies Seminary in Warren, Rhode Island; it has been posited that she studied drawing and painting at that institution. She married Edward Nelson Davis of Norwich, Connecticut, on February 1, 1841, and lived with him in that town for a time. On January 10, 1842, she gave birth to a child. The family moved to Providence, Rhode Island; there she gave birth to another child, her second, on April 26, 1847. In August 1854 she produced her last portrait, of Luella Hodges. She died of tuberculosis eight months later, and was buried in Swan Point Cemetery in Providence. It was common for women artists of the era to sign their work using only their initials, and Davis was no different in this regard; consequently, it was for many years assumed that she was male. In 1981 collectors Sybil and Arthur Kern identified the artist by name, further confirming their identification with two later reports. She produced miniature portraits, working in watercolor and pencil. Most of her subjects are depicted in three-quarter view, at bust length. Often they are clothed in black. Several characteristics appear in many of her depictions: a ragged part in the hair, bluish coloring of the eyelids, a wide and colored horizontal band below the bust, and negative space between the subject's arms and body. The artist sometimes incorporated flowers into her compositions. Many pieces were signed and dated; some also included the subject's name. Davis is known to have produced over 200 portraits, mostly of residents of the areas in which she lived. The subjects may be James Henry Bixby (1822-1908) of Webster, MA, who married Lydia Goddard (1825-1855) on December 24, 1844. Their home in Webster was where the town hall is located today. An ardent Baptist and anti-Catholic, Bixby is said to have worn on his back a placard reading "Down with Popery." More than forty portraits are attributed to Jane Anthony Davis, of which only three are signed. The painter was known to have worked in Providence and Warwick, Rhode Island, and Norwich, CT. Half-length full frontal painted sketch of a young gentleman with short blackish-brown hair and eyes; seated in a painted fancy chair, dressed in a black suit coat with black waistcoat and white shirt, he has on a black cravat and gray trousers, in his two hands he holds a book; a little color has been applied to his cheeks, the chair, and the book. Ink inscription on back of portrait: “By J. A. Davis/ Nov. 10th, 1845” Wooden frame
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