John Freake

Artist Freake-Gibbs Painter (American, active about 1670)

Dateabout 1671–1674

Mediumoil on canvas

Dimensionscanvas: 108 × 93.3 cm (42 1/2 × 36 3/4 in.)
framed: 128 × 113 cm (50 3/8 × 44 1/2 in.)

ClassificationsPaintings

Credit LineSarah C. Garver Fund

Terms

Object number1963.135

DescriptionJohn Freake is a three-quarter-length portrait of a man turned slightly to the right. His dark brown hair is parted in the center and falls on his shoulders. He has dark brown eyebrows, brown eyes, and a narrow moustache of the same color. His flesh tones are predominantly pink with deeper red on the cheeks and lips. The face is drawn as an oval with a pointed chin. The nose is straight and narrow.

The figure stands perfectly erect with both arms bent at different angles so that the hands are presented in front of the body at different heights. The proper left hand rests at the center of the chest with the fingers turned up and touching a tassel. The proper right hand is held at hip level and holds a pair of gloves. The extended fingers of the right hand have become transparent over time, suggesting that the artist represented them folded under to grasp the gloves before changing them to their current position. The variation in hand placement—higher/lower, centered/off center—results in the right elbow projecting out from the body and the left elbow held closer in, lending an interesting asymmetry to the composition.

The figure is dressed in a dark brown coat that flares out at the sides. The sleeves of the coat end halfway down the forearm, revealing voluminous white tufted sleeves with ruffled cuffs. The coat is ornamented with twenty-two silver buttons in front, more of which are covered by the left hand; others are unseen because the coat is truncated by the bottom edge of the composition. Each buttonhole is outlined with silver thread. Only the top seven buttons are fastened. In addition, two groups of four buttons each run horizontally at different heights on the proper right side of the coat, presumably to secure pockets. The pocket closest to the front closure is lower than the outer one. The figure wears a white lace collar that lies flat across the chest and turns up in a gentle arc at the neck to frame the jawline. The collar roughly forms a rectangle with rounded corners. The dark brown of the coat shows through the negative spaces of the lace, which features vines wrapping around circular flowers. The pattern is mirrored either side of the closure. The man wears a gold-framed oval pin at the throat, a white ornament at the base of the lace collar, and a gold signet ring on the little finger of the proper left hand. The background is an even tone of dark brown, just a shade lighter than the coat.
Label TextThe Freakes were one of the richest families in 17th-century Boston. In the 1670s, John Freake—a merchant and an attorney—commissioned these portraits, which are among the ten paintings attributed to the Freake-Gibbs Painter, whose flat, decorative style reflects England’s Elizabethan art tradition. Despite Puritan sentiment towards austerity, these paintings display the Freake family’s wealth. The artist highlighted colorful details in the sitters’ attire and material possessions, which appear in John Freake’s inventory of 1675—other personal assets include six ships, land, and “one Negroe named Coffee” valued at £30. Dressed in fine lace and pearls, Elizabeth Freake exudes decorum while seated on a turkey-work upholstered chair with her youngest daughter Mary. Research and technical examination of the portraits show the artist reworked both canvases around 1674, adding Baby Mary and updating their clothing. By conveying their social status through luxury goods, the Freake portraits offer insight into the refinement of New England’s emerging mercantile class, who benefitted from slavery and global trade. Source: Probate inventory of the estate of John Freake, 24th day, 7th month, 1675, Suffolk County, miscellaneous docket, V, 294-96.ProvenanceJohn Freake (1635–1675) and Elizabeth Freake (1642–1713) to their daughter Mary Freake Wolcott (Mrs. Josiah Wolcott) (1674–1752); to her grandson Josiah Wolcott (1733–1796), Oxford, Massachusetts; to his daughter Elizabeth Wolcott Sigourney (Mrs. Andrew Sigourney) (1761–1829); to her daughter Mary Sigourney Town Hunt (1799–1860); to her daughter Mrs. William Wallace, Tennessee; willed to her first cousin John Wolcott Wetherell (b. 1820), Worcester, Massachusetts; whose wife willed them to Wetherell's first cousin once removed, Myrtis S. Sigourney (Mrs. Gilbert H. Harrington, later Mrs. William B. Scofield) (1860–1939); to her brother Andrew Wolcott Sigourney (b. 1880) and his wife, Katherine H. Sigourney (d. 1963), Princeton, Massachusetts; to their four children, Andrew Sigourney, Suzanne Sigourney (Mrs. Robert E. Leonard), Katherine M. Shaver, and Carolyn O. Holtz, Princeton MA; purchased by the Worcester Art Museum, 1963.

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