Charles Prendergast (1863-1948)
Donkey Rider, ca. 1915-1917
Tempera, pencil, gold and silver leaf on incised, gessoed panel
Williams College Museum of Art, Gift of Mrs. Charles Prendergast, 86.18.81
Charles Prendergast (1863-1948)
Frame, 19th-20th Century
Gilding and wood
Williams College Museum of Art, Gift of Mrs. Charles Prendergast 86.18.81.FR
Delicate and lively, Donkey Rider is rendered in sumptuous patterns of gold and silver leaf that alternate throughout the composition. The images of the rider, donkey, female figures, golden vines, and the basket of fruit are motifs that are repeated in Charles’s panels throughout his oeuvre, including in The Riders, ca. 1915, as symbols of abundance and rebirth. The rider-figure reappears in Charles’s work in the 1930s and 1940s in paintings such as Circus Rider No. 9, ca. 1940, in which the rider is no longer a quasi-religious figure, but a typical member of contemporary life.