准备圣诞节（火鸡） - 美国大都会艺术博物馆展品查阅

品名（中）	准备圣诞节（火鸡）
品名（英）	Preparing for Christmas (Plucking Turkeys)
入馆年号	2016年，2016.797.19
策展部门	美国之翼（The American Wing）
创作者	Francis William Edmonds【1806 至 1863】【美国人】
创作年份	公元 1851
创作地区
分类
尺寸	23 × 33 英寸 (58.4 × 83.8 厘米)
介绍（中）	埃德蒙兹出生于纽约哈德逊，是为数不多的19世纪美国画家之一，他追求艺术和商业双重职业，成为纽约市银行、政治和文化等相关领域的重要人物。埃德蒙兹是美国国家设计学院年度展览的常客，他以受17世纪荷兰绘画启发的这幅作品等流行流派场景而闻名。"准备圣诞节"代表农场的季节性活动。当两个白人男子为节日大餐拔火鸡时，一个年轻的黑人身影，站在他们中间，漫不经心地温暖着他的双手在19世纪50年代动荡的十年里，当美国就奴隶制向新的西部领土扩张展开辩论时，埃德蒙兹和其他纽约艺术家经常用显眼的非裔美国人作画。通常被描绘成幽默的主题，有些人被描绘得更有同情心。埃德蒙兹虽然在贵格会学校接受教育，大概具有废奴主义的敏感性，但这里似乎强调了与白人工人相比，黑人角色缺乏生产力。这幅画曾在1852年美国艺术联盟（American Art Union）的拍卖会上亮相，该组织是一个以订阅为基础的组织，通过展览和发行流行版画在全国推广美国艺术。
介绍（英）	Born in Hudson, New York, Edmonds is one of few known nineteenth-century American painters who pursued dual careers in art and business, becoming an influential figure in the interrelated spheres of banking, politics, and culture in New York City. A regular contributor to the National Academy of Design’s annual exhibitions, Edmonds made his reputation with popular genre scenes such as this work, inspired by seventeenth-century Dutch painting. "Preparing for Christmas" represents a seasonal activity on a farm. While two White men pluck turkeys for the holiday feast—unperturbed by the winter cold—a younger Black figure, positioned between them, inattentively warms his hands. In the tumultuous decade of the 1850s, when the United States was debating the expansion of slavery into new Western territories, Edmonds and other New York artists often painted works with conspicuously placed African Americans. Generally portrayed as humorous subjects, some were depicted with greater empathy. Edmonds, while educated in Quaker schools with a presumably abolitionist sensibility, here seems to emphasize the Black character’s lack of productivity when compared to the White workers. The painting was featured in the 1852 auction of the American Art-Union, a subscription-based organization that promoted American art nationally through exhibitions and the distribution of popular prints.