THE ART CONNECTION

As an artist, the collecting of these wonderful,  historic tintypes was made doubly satisfying by the emergence of scores of images to do with artists... and especially American artists who I had personally admired. But even more exciting was, as big a cynic as Mark Twain was, he knew and loved some of my personal favorites. I cannot rule out that the artists in the "Twain collection" may have been assembled by his wife Olivia, as she was an art enthusiast, and in fact helped to found an art school in Hartford Connecticut.

Some has been written already as to the cultural affinity between the writings of Mark Twain and the canvases of Winslow Homer. I cannot find where he ever owned a single work by Homer, but publishers have married the two by using Homer's Americana on the covers of many of Twain's books.

 A strange, "up the nostril" shaved head view of 

Winslow Homer (center), perhaps a tintype"selfie"!

Several tintypes in this collection surfaced that appeared to be Winslow Homer, which I initially had struggled to identify as Wyatt Earp instead. There were a few large, half-plate tintypes in the collection... more expensive, requiring some kind of frame, half-plate tintypes which suggest a greater status or personal  importance to the owner... and this unusually large tintype of Homer may be an American treasure as well...

One can never know, given Twain's satirical mind, just what he loved and what he despised, as he loved most that which he could lampoon and get the most laughs. In spite of his inborn skepticism and incessant sarcasm, he loved, and even wrote his adoration for the work of Frederic Church.

One of the premier American landscapists, Twain actually 

visited his studio and corresponded with him. Twain's taste  

 in art was right in sinc with his readership. Mine is the

 larger one in the middle.

The Twain archives also reveal at least correspondence with one of my personal idols, western artist Frederic Remington. Remington was an avid outdoorsman and sportsman, and is caught here wearing a baseball uniform.

Remington (mine enlarged in the center, and far right)

 when still nimble enough to play. He was the father

 of the Western or "cowboy" artists.

Remington and Twain were peers. Both wrote for the leading publication in the country, Harper's Monthly. I have not found an instance where Remington might have illustrated one of Twain's articles, but it surely came up. What little I know about each man, each was too egotistical to reach out to the other. But the mere presence of this photo suggests a quiet if not friendly competition between these two giants in American culture.