Collections record Beta

Pastel - "Auction at the Glebe"

1977-32-0

A scene of a country auction which is being held to the south east of the house known as "The Glebe" on North St. in Litchfield. A small crowd is gathered under two trees. The artist has taken some liberties with the perspective of the house itself since the service wings appear to be attached to the gable end of the main block while in fact they are constructed with their gables running east and west to the house proper. The house is painted a yellowish cream color with green louvered shutters and brick chimneys. The auctioneer stands on an elevated platform to right of center and an articles to be auctioned are sitting throughout the yard - a cupboard with glazed doors, a bench painted light green, a three drawer chest with French feet and various utilitarian objects such as a wash basin and bowl. Pastel is framed under glass. Frame is gold painted wood.

The Glebe House is so called because it was built on part of the Glebe Land - owned by the First Congregational Church minister Timothy Collins. The house on the property was built by Julius Deming for his daughter Clarissa Deming (Litchfield Female Academy) and her husband Charles Perkins (Litchfield Law School). The house was later owned by their daughter Edith Howell Perkins Rockhill. She and her husband William Rockhill sold the house in 1923 and held an auction at that time of which this pastel depicts. They sold the house to F. Kingsbury Bull, Ludlow S. Bull and Dorothy Bull (siblings) who had previously lived on the corner of North St. (across from the jail) This property is commonly known as the Corner House.

Albert Sheldon Pennoyer was born in Oakland, California, on April 5, 1888. He studied briefly at the University of California moving to Paris in 1912 to study architecture. The following year he gave up architecture and instead took up painting and studied at the Académie Julian and Académie de la Grand Chaumiére. He returned to the United States at the onset of World War I, and served from 1917 to 1920 in the camouflage unit of the Army Corps of Engineers, and then from 1920 to 1928 in the Officers’ Reserve Corp. In 1921, Pennoyer set up a studio in New York City where he would work at regular intervals for the next thirty-eight years. Pennoyer also spent large amounts of time at his mother’s home in Litchfield, producing Connecticut landscapes in pastel and oil and multiple scenes of Litchfield, both past and present. Pennoyer served again in World War II, first with the U.S. Army Air Force and the Corps of Engineers before joining the Monuments, Fine Arts, and Archives program (MFAA, better known as the Monuments Men). Given a Leica camera, a car, and a driver, Pennoyer was involved in the repair, recovery, and documentation of cultural heritage in Italy from 1943-1945. Pennoyer assisted in the recovery and return of artwork evacuated from public collections by Italian officials and storage in safer repositories in the Tuscan countryside. His photographs document the work of the MFAA, the destruction of monuments and buildings caused by German occupation and allied bombing, and the physical and emotional toll felt by the residents.

• Pennoyer, Albert Sheldon, 1887-1957

1923

Canvas 17 1/2" long x 23 1/2" wide Frame 27 3/4" long x 21 3/4" wide

• pastel
• paper