Additional Images

Provenance:

Joyner Waddington's, Toronto, ON, 7 Dec 2005, lot 407, as Portrait of an Indian Chief
Private Collection, Toronto, ON

Note:

Peter Clapham Sheppard’s portrait Dominique La Plante, Thunder Cloud marks his early accomplishment and ambition. It appears to have been exhibited when Sheppard was still a student at the Ontario College of Art and not long after a writer for The Globe (Toronto) described it as “splendidly done,” when they saw it at OCA’s annual exhibition of student work.[1] Seven years later it was included in a group exhibition at The Heliconian Club in Toronto that included his OCA classmate Frederick Loveroff, the review of which The Globe’s writer remarked the “regal, red-blanketed Indian is an outstanding example” of Sheppard’s subjects from humanity.[2]

Still a student and in his mid-20s, Sheppard met a model who had worked in the United States for Eulabee Dix, as well as Frederick Remington and John Singer Sargent.[3] When La Plante visited Toronto in April 1913 and was painted by Sheppard, he was also photographed by M.O. Hammond at the request of future Group of Seven member Franz Johnston and for Hammond’s own work.[4] He also modelled for Emanuel Hahn, Thunder Cloud and Indian Scout, both from 1913 and in the collection of the National Gallery of Canada.[5]

Like Sheppard’s two other known studies of La Plante, (Dominique La Plante, Thundercloud, 1912-1914, pastel on paper, 73 x 45.7 cm and a painting reproduced in The Toronto Sunday World in 1923), this painting is much more accomplished and attentive than a classroom exercise.[6] A young artist at the outset of his career, Sheppard’s portrayal of the nearly 60-year-old La Plante captures the physiognomy and dignity of his sitter and evokes the viewer’s empathy. Painted on a dark ground, in the tradition of the great 17th century portraitists Anthony van Dyck, Diego Velázquez and closer to Sheppard’s own time, John Singer Sargent, with bold brushstrokes that sculpt La Plante’s features more than they paint them, it is no surprise this painting was noticed early on. With a rare maturity that augured his singular artistic development and achievement, Sheppard made the most of the fewest brushstrokes to portray a figure who had been rendered by older, more experienced and more famous artists.

[1] “Art Students’ Work Shows Much Merit,” The Globe, 17 May 1913, 8.
[2] “Art and Artists,” The Globe, 17 Jan 1920, 10.
[3] “Chief Thundercloud Dies,” The New York Times, 14 Mar 1916, 11.
[4] Janet Dewan, “The Mourner: ‘Red Man’s Memories,’” The History of Photography, vol. 15, no. 2, 137.
[5] Emanuel Hahn, Indian Scout, 1913, bronze, 85.5 x 27.8 x 42.2 cm, National Gallery of Canada, Purchased 1917, acc. no. 1429; and Thunder Cloud, 1913, bronze, 47.8 x 29 x 26.6 cm, National Gallery of Canada, Purchased 1929, acc. no. 3685.
[6] An Artist’s Model, “The Life Of An Artists [sic] Model Is Not An Easy One,” The Toronto Sunday World, 3 Jun 1923, 5.