Jonathan Poor Mural

Scheduled for demolition, the 19th century wall paintings decorating the dining room of the Silas Burbank house in Mt. Vernon, Maine were saved from destruction in 1985 by Cunningham-Adams for a New York City art dealer who had been alerted to the potential loss of the valuable collection of early American art. Executed in tempera paint directly on a white-washed wall, the several sections of wall throughout the room showed a continuous landscape of rolling hills seen through trees, and featured a peaceful harbor on the largest wall with several sailing ships in the distance.

Cunningham-Adams removed the seven wall sections on which the wall paintings were painted and transported them to her studio where restoration of the large scene was undertaken over a period of a year.

The restoration included removal of wooden lath from the reverse of the painting’s plaster support; consolidation of the painting’s plaster support; mounting of painting on an aluminum honeycomb synthetic support; consolidation of the tempera paint layer; removal of intermittent sections of wall paper, paste and dirt from the paint layer, aesthetic compensation for the loss of original paint with in-painting; application of a matte surface protection layer.

During the cleaning, the artist’s signature and date were found. The small skiff being sailed by a man in a top hat, often the only signature used by Poor’s more famous uncle, Rufus Porter, here belied the true authorship of the painting until our discovery of Poor’s stencil-like signature: JDPoor 1830. The appearance of the man sailing in a top hat may mean that Poor’s uncle worked with him on this painting, however.

The painting is now owned by the National Heritage Museum in Lexington, MA and is exhibited in the museum’s Van Gorden-Williams Library and Archives.