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Nauvoo
Exhibits Open at Church Museum
Two new exhibitions
at the Museum of Church History and Art feature artifacts, memorabilia
and art relating to historic Nauvoo, Illinois, and the Nauvoo Temple.
The exhibits, Early Images of Historic Nauvoo and Sutcliffe
Maudsley: Nauvoo Portrait Artist, will be on view starting Saturday,
20 April 2002, and will continue throughout the summer and early
fall.
Many members
of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints are anticipating
the dedication of the Nauvoo Illinois Temple in June of this year.
The new museum exhibits in Salt Lake City are timely and can provide
rare perspectives of early Nauvoo.
Early Images
of Historic Nauvoo celebrates this once thriving Latter-day
Saint community nestled on the banks of the Mississippi River with
original 19th-century paintings, engravings, photographs and drawings.
The city's most significant architectural landmark, the Nauvoo Temple,
is highlighted in many of the works.
According to
curator Richard G. Oman, only a handful of 19th-century paintings
exist of the city of Nauvoo. One of them, included in the exhibit,
is an oil painting created by an unknown artist between 1848 and
1850, after the Saints fled west. Also displayed is a photographic
print from a Lucian Foster's1846 daguerreotype (a photo produced
on a metal plate). It is the only known photograph of the city taken
while Nauvoo served as Church headquarters.
Publishers in
the eastern United States and Europe were eager for images of the
abandoned religious metropolis, Oman said. They used engravings
made from paintings and drawings, and frequently used images of
the destroyed Nauvoo temple to create a dramatic image of a deserted
city.
"The exhibit
features historical images of the Nauvoo Temple that helped architects
reconstruct the temple," he explained. Among the most useful of
the early sources, Oman said, are the original architectural drawings
by William Weeks and an 1853 engraving of the temple ruins by Frederick
Piercy.
Oman said an
1847 daguerreotype of the Nauvoo Temple provided one of the clearest
visual records of the temple's exterior appearance. "Original stone
pieces, rafter fragments and door keys have been preserved as mementos
and represent the physical documentation of the destroyed temple,"
said Oman, observing that examples of memorabilia are also on display
in the exhibition.
Early Images
of Historic Nauvoo will be displayed in the museum's main lobby
through 17 November 2002.
"Another significant
exhibit opening at the museum features the art of Sutcliffe Maudsley,
one of early Nauvoo's most prominent and prolific artists," said
Glen M. Leonard, director of the Museum of Church History and Art.
Sutcliffe
Maudsley: Nauvoo Portrait Artist includes extremely rare portraits
of the Prophet Joseph Smith, members of the prophet's family and
other residents of Nauvoo. Maudsley's portraits have become important
artistic and historical records. He painted from life some of the
only known original images of Joseph and Hyrum Smith.
Guest curator
Steven Bule, an art historian and associate professor of art and
humanities at Utah Valley State College, said that Maudsley originally
worked in the textile mills in Lancashire County, England, where
he designed patterns that were printed on calico cloth. He was converted
to The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints by some of the
first missionaries to England and immigrated to Nauvoo in 1842.
Within months
of his arrival, Maudsley prepared a full-figure watercolor of Lieutenant
General Joseph Smith for a map of the city and painted many other
portraits of Nauvoo residents.
This first profile
of Joseph Smith became the prototype for multiple copies later made
by Maudsley. The exhibit includes a half dozen Maudsley drawings
and several lithographic versions of Joseph Smith in nearly the
exact pose.
"The exhibit
features several beautiful sets of companion portraits," Bule said.
"Among them are profiles of Joseph and Emma Smith, Hyrum and Mary
Fielding Smith, and George Albert and Bathsheba Bigler Smith."
"Companion portraits
were common in the 19th century before photography became popular,"
Bule said. "They were a symbol of the love and union shared by a
couple and were prominently displayed in the home."
Maudsley also
painted portraits of three of the children of Joseph and Emma Smith.
On display are a rare portrait of Frederick G.W. Smith as a boy
of about 8 years and a copy of a watercolor of Alexander Hale Smith
standing with his mother, Emma. Maudsley also painted a now lost
portrait of Joseph Smith III.
"Some of Maudsley's
best portraits are of people we have not yet been able to identify,"
said Bule. "These people may have been residents of Nauvoo who commissioned
the portraits or members of the Maudsley family. We simply don't
know. Perhaps museum visitors who see these portraits will be able
to help us identify them."
All of the known
portraits by Sutcliffe Maudsley are represented in the exhibit either
as originals or as photographic copies.
Sutcliffe
Maudsley: Nauvoo Portrait Artist is located in the newly renovated
Theater Foyer gallery on the lower level of the museum. The exhibit
will be on display through 10 November 2002.
Both exhibits
can be seen at the museum any day of the week. The museum is open
Monday through Friday from 9:00 a.m. to 9:00 p.m. and Saturday,
Sunday and most holidays from 10:00 a.m. to 7:00 p.m. The museum
is located at 45 North West Temple Street in downtown Salt Lake
City and just one-half block north of the Temple Square TRAX station.
Admission is free.
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