James E. Freeman and the painting of sentiment

Editorial Staff Art

November 2009 | Thoughout his half-century-long artistic career in the United States and Italy, James E. Freeman (Fig. 2) specialized in creating paintings of sentiment that sought to cross the boundaries dividing different cultures and social classes by engaging emotions, encouraging empathy, and ultimately prompting benefi­cence.1 Sentimentalism flourished in the antebellum period as a sort of bridge between the overt …