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The Power of Music
From the collection of Cleveland Museum of Art. Free to download, adapt and use — no permission needed.
About this work
Set in rural Long Island before the Civil War, Mount's complex painting presents an African American laborer listening intently to a fiddle tune enjoyed by white men. While a love of music unites the figures in a bond of shared humanity, the two races occupy different spaces--one inside, one outside, both separated by a barn door--effectively symbolizing the pronounced divisions in America at the time.
Cleveland Museum of Art’s own descriptionCredit lineThe Power of Music, 1847. William Sidney Mount (American, 1807–1868). Oil on canvas; framed: 67 x 78 x 7.5 cm (26 3/8 x 30 11/16 x 2 15/16 in.); unframed: 43.4 x 53.5 cm (17 1/16 x 21 1/16 in.). The Cleveland Museum of Art, Leonard C. Hanna Jr. Fund, 1991.110
