Rare Embroidered and Painted Silk Mourning Picture, Jane M. Hewlett, New York, circa 1825

Worked in silk, chenille, paint and ink on silk, inscribed on the glass, Jane M. Hewlett.

American Needlework Treasures: Samplers and Embroideries from the Collection of Betty Ring at the Museum of American Folk Art (p. 97, fig. 155)

In the original giltwood frame and eglomise mat; some foxing; spots; small tear in the sky; some loss in black eglomise borders.
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Jane's embroidery belongs to a recognizable group of New York memorials, c. 1810-1825. The frame originally had large, shell-shaped projecting corners that have been removed. Jane Mitchell Hewlett (1811-1834) was the daughter of Whitehead Hewlett and the granddaughter of George Hewlett, all of Great Neck, Long Island. On December 27,1831, she married Dr. William Wilmot Kissam (1806-1842) and died childless, aged twenty-three. A companion piece was worked by Mary Ann Hewlett, and it is now at the Museums at Stony Brook, Stony Brook, Long Island. For a similar composition painted on velvet, see Anita Schorsch, Mourning Becomes America, No. 64/209.