Fishing on the River, Autumn

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Henry Church
Fishing on the River, Autumn
circa 1860

About the Item

A self-taught rock carver and painter from Chagrin Falls, Ohio, Henry Church did bas-relief rock carving, of which the most famous is the 30 foot-high "Squaw Rock", which can be seen from the Chagrin River. The formal name is "The Rape of the Indian Tribes by the White Man". About twelve miles from Cleveland, this carving has become a local landmark with a picnic grounds nearby. The name relates to the carved rock life-size female nude encircled by a snake, intended to symbolize the rape of the American Indian by the white man. Reportedly Church carved the Indian woman by lantern light, and the subject, according to Jessie Sargent, daughter of the carver, related to his strong, spiritual feelings for the Indians. Also included with the grouping but without apparent connection is a child in a crib, a tomahawk, a skeleton, a mountain lion hanging by its tail and an eagle with its wings spread, perhaps readied to rescue the woman from the snake. On certain days, Henry Church would stand on a pulpit he had carved from rock overlooking the valley and would preach sermons "to the congregated spirits of the thousands of Indians massacred by the settlers". Henry Church was a blacksmith who lived in Chagrin Falls and had a reputation for eccentricity. Twenty years before his death, he carved his own tombstone, "an angry lion with green glass eyes". Beside the lion was a child and a contented lamb, and together the scene represented the Peaceable Kingdom referenced in the Bible. Church preached his own funeral sermon, which he pre-recorded on a gramophone cylinder that was played at the burial service in the local Evergreen Hill Cemetery. The trustees of the cemetery had opposed the tombstone being installed claiming it was too ugly, and the fight lasted for years until Church threatened to live forever. Apparently that had some affect as the trustees gave in, but likely they regretted it because the sermon on the gramophone was "a scathing denunciation of his enemies, especially the trustees of the cemetery." Henry Church also did paintings, several which later were exhibited at the Museum of Modern Art. Among his painting subjects were monkeys, still lifes, portraits and landscapes. Unfortunately Church's daughter burned many of her father's paintings because she lost her home from debt and had to move into a space that had no room for housing her father's artwork. She had taken care of them for thirty years and justified her actions by saying "Nobody liked them. Nobody wanted them. I didn't want them to fall into the hands of anybody who wouldn't take care of them. So I did what my father would have done. I destroyed them. All but these few." Henry Church was born in Chagrin Falls on May 20, 1836 and was too sickly growing up to attend school, so he was taught at home by his mother. He later said that this isolation had much affect on his adult life. HIs father and mother had arrived there in 1834 from Deerfield, Massachusetts. They were strongly opposed to slavery, and their home was a part of the Underground Railroad. They were also part of a group of local spiritualists that communicated with the other world by "rappings and tappings". At age thirteen, Henry began working in his father's blacksmith shop, and often Henry would grab charcoal and do drawings. He married Martha Prebble in 1859, and they lived in Chagrin Falls, raising two children, Jessie and Henry Austin. He avoided the Civil War by paying four-hundred dollars for a replacement. After the War, he painted a portrait of Abraham Lincoln and give it to the local chapter of the Grand Army of the Republic. However, they kept it in the cellar. After the death of his father, who discouraged his son's art talent, Henry Church pursued his art seriously and set up a studio and gallery above the blacksmith shop. He had no market and little local interest in his work. Henry Church died at age seventy-two on April 17, 1908. HIs rock carvings were subsequently vandalized, but the WPA (Works Project Administration) erected a formal sign and built a base under the rock preventing the Chagrin River from undermining the rock.

Creator:
Henry Church (1836 - 1908, American)
Creation Year:
circa 1860
Dimensions:
Height: 14 in (35.56 cm)Width: 20 in (50.8 cm)
Medium:
Oil
Movement & Style:
Folk Art
Period:
Mid-19th Century
Condition:
Gallery Location:
Graton, CA
Reference Number:
1stDibs: LU31021921743

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