Object details
Object number
ARC.006481
Creator(s)
Title
Hands of F. Marion Crawford and Isabella Stewart Gardner
Date
about 1882
Medium
Ink on albumen print
Language
Italian
Dimensions
21.4 x 13 cm (8 7/16 x 5 1/8 in.)
Signatures, inscriptions, and markings
Inscribed in ink (bottom left) in F. Marion Crawford's hand: Due son le mani unite dall'amore- un spirito delle unisce, ed un sol core [translation: Two are the hands united in love- one spirit united and a single heart]
Printed in ink (bottom): Cross. / Boudoir Portraits. / Salem.
Provenance
A gift from author F. Marion Crawford (1854-1909) to Isabella Stewart Gardner in 1882.
Commentary
The hands in this photograph belong to Isabella Stewart Gardner and the novelist F. Marion Crawford. Belonging to the same social circle in Boston, Gardner and Crawford bonded over a love of the Italian poet Dante. Their close relationship inspired rumors of an affair to swirl around them. It is impossible to know whether or not the two had a physical affair, but the surviving traces of their mutual admiration have romantic undertones. Crawford inscribed this photograph with, "Two hands are united in love—one spirit united and a single heart."
Bibliography
Nathaniel Silver and Diana Seave Greenwald. Isabella Stewart Gardner: A Life (Boston, 2022), 51-52, fig. 23.
Diana Seave Greenwald, "Did They or Didn't They? F. Marion Crawford and Isabella Stewart Gardner," Inside the Collection (blog), Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum, 5 March 2024, https://www.gardnermuseum.org/blog/f-marion-crawford-and-isabella-stewart-gardner
Gallery
Blue Room
Case
Crawford / Chapman Case
Rights and reproductions
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