Caption:
Mr. and Mrs. Anson Phelps Stokes. Artist: Cecilia Beaux (American, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania 1855-1942 Gloucester, Massachusetts). Dimensions: 72 1/16 x 39 7/8 in. (183 x 101.3 cm). Date: 1898 (?).
This portrait by the esteemed figure painter Cecilia Beaux depicts Anson Phelps Stokes (1838-1913) and his wife, Helen Louisa Stokes (1846-1930), in their Madison Avenue residence. The unconventional composition foregrounding the woman, with the man modestly relegated to the background, echoes John Singer Sargent's famous portrait of the sitters' daughter-in-law and son painted in London the previous year (38.104).