The Committee of Public Comfort
Date1899
Artist
Arthur Burdett Frost
(American illustrator and author, 1851–1928)
Illustration CitationThe Chronicles of Aunt Minervy Ann, by Joel Chandler Harris (New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1899)
MediumWatercolor on illustration board
Dimensionscomposition: 12 1/2 × 16 1/2 in. (31.8 × 41.9 cm)
support: 15 5/8 × 20 3/8 in. (39.7 × 51.8 cm)
support: 15 5/8 × 20 3/8 in. (39.7 × 51.8 cm)
Credit LineAcquisition Fund, 2015
Object number2015-4
On View
Not on viewClassificationsDRAWING
Label TextArthur Burdett Frost began his career in 1876 as a staff artist for Harper and Brothers in New York City, where - along with Howard Pyle, Charles Reinhart, and Edwin Austin Abbey - he was hired by art editor Charles Parsons. Frost’s popular illustrations for his most enduringly famous work, Joel Chandler Harris’ Uncle Remus stories (1892), led to his commission for Harris’ 1899 novel The Chronicles of Aunt Minervy Ann, a humorous tale of the goings-on in a rural Georgia town. This drawing is distinguished by the dynamic movement and subtle expressions that Frost was famous for. In the scene, startled disembarking train passengers— skirts billowing, arms flailing, faces puzzled—are rushed along by the mayor and his cronies toward the delights of the local fair.
Frost inscribed the illustration “to my friend George Harding.” Illustrator George Harding (1827–1910; Pyle student) illustrated for Harris in 1909-1910, which is probably how Frost knew him.
