Frank Duveneck (American/Cincinnati, 1848-1919)
Oil on canvas
Signed l.r.
Titled "Assisi”, and dated 1905 l.r.
Size: 30.75" wd. x 22.25" ht. (sight) and 34.25" wd. x 22.75" ht. (framed)
Period red-rimmed label to verso stretcher with full title "Lower Church of St. Francis of Assisi”
Red painted accession number 1915.69 to verso stretcher
Exhibition label from the Cincinnati University Club, "Annual Art Exhibition”, 1989 affixed to verso stretcher

Frank Duveneck solidified his position as one of the fathers of the "Golden Age of Cincinnati Art” with several donations to the Cincinnati Art Museum prior to his death and with a bequest of much of his estate to the institution upon his passing in 1919. Among them was this example, "Lower Church of St. Francis of Assisi”, given in 1915. Another larger work (Accession number 1915.68) remains in the permanent collection of the Cincinnati Art Museum.

The execution of this painting, as well as the larger extant example at the Cincinnati Art Museum coincides neatly with Duveneck’s involvement with the murals at the Cathedral Basilica of the Assumption, in Covington, KY. As a devout Catholic and Covington resident, Duveneck spent over 4 years preparing for and producing a triptych set of murals for the Church, which he completed in 1909. A wonderful excerpt from the Kentucky Post and Times-Star, dated August 14, 1905, is an early mention of Duveneck's work on the murals: "Frank Duveneck, the Covington painter, and Clement Barnhorn, the Cincinnati sculptor, are now in Munich studying designs for the mural decorations and paintings. They will begin work immediately upon their return in the Fall.”

Duveneck certainly went to Italy during this trip, though it is not covered in the periodicals of the day. His association with Italy is well known- he took numerous trips there with his "Duveneck Boys”, a group of students including several of the foremost American Impressionists, and the artist's own work from that area, which are considered some of his most important work.

It appears Duveneck produced two canvases in a short period of time of St. Francis of Assisi. The view currently held at the Cincinnati Art Museum is an expansive study of the murals in the lower church, and it faces the same fence depicted in the example offered here.

In previous decades, the Cincinnati Art Museum held occasional deaccessioning sales. The late Cincinnati art dealers Charles and Patricia Weiner (of Patricia Weiner Gallery) acquired this example from one such sale.

Provenance
The artist
Gifted by the above to the Cincinnati Art Museum, 1915
The Patricia Weiner Gallery
Purchased from the above, Private Collection