Background
Huntington was born in New York City, New York, in 1816. He was the son of Benjamin and Faith Trumbull (Huntington) Huntington. His maternal grandfather was Gen. Jedediah Huntington.
Huntington was born in New York City, New York, in 1816. He was the son of Benjamin and Faith Trumbull (Huntington) Huntington. His maternal grandfather was Gen. Jedediah Huntington.
When a boy Daniel was sent to New Haven to be prepared for Yale University by the Rev. Horace Bushnell. After a year at Yale he entered Hamilton College in central New York in 1832.
While in Hamilton College he made the acquaintance of Charles Loring Elliott, who was only four years older than he but yet able to make a more or less precarious living by going from place to place painting portraits at a nominal price. It was such an enterprise that brought Elliott to Hamilton College where he painted students' portraits at five dollars each. Huntington's was one of those he painted. Encouraged by Elliott's favorable comments on his work Huntington seems at that time to have determined to become an artist. At least he borrowed brushes and other materials from Elliott and made attempts at painting groups of his friends.
After leaving college in 1836 he at once returned to his home in New York City and forthwith placed himself under Samuel F. B. Morse who was president of the National Academy of Design and professor of the literature of art in the University of the City of New York. A little later he became a student under Inman. In time he entered the National Academy and progressed so rapidly that in 1838 he had the honor of having his portrait of his father hung "on the line. " In 1837 he had exhibited "The Barroom Politician" and "A Toper Asleep, " and in the previous year he had spent some six months doing landscapes in the Catskills. He thus definitely associated himself with the so-called Hudson River School. To this period belong "Dunderberg Mountain" and "The Roundout Hill – Twilight. " The year 1839 Huntington spent in Rome, Florence, and Paris. From Florence came the "Florentine Girl" and the "Sibyl" which later was engraved by John William Casilaer. In Rome he painted "The Shepherd Boy" and the "Early Christian Prisoners. " Upon his return to New York in 1840 he painted "Mercy's Dream, " of which he later made several replicas. At this time he also produced "Christiana and her Children. "
He found himself called upon to paint many portraits, and this work he alternated with an ambitious attempt to illustrate The Pilgrim's Progress. Owing to an inflammation of the eyes, however, he was obliged to curtail his work, so with his bride, Harriet Sophia Richards, he departed once more for Italy. For three years he remained in Rome, whence he sent back "The Roman Penitents, " "The Sacred Lesson, " and some landscapes. After returning to New York in 1845 he resumed his major work, portraiture, although at the same time he found opportunity to execute historic and genre subjects.
In 1851 he left America to visit the exhibition at the Crystal Palace, London. He was invited to paint the portraits of many distinguished foreigners, among whom were Sir Charles Eastlake and the Earl of Carlisle, and remained abroad until 1858. Except for the years 1869-77 he was president of the National Academy from 1862 to 1891. In 1882 he once more visited Europe, this time going to Spain, where among other works he painted "The Goldsmith's Daughter" and "The Doubtful Letter. "
His life may be said to have spanned nearly a century of American painting. His subjects, when not portraits, were largely devoted to narrative, historic themes in which morality and virtue were emphasized. Even his portraits, which totaled a thousand out of his list of twelve hundred works, are conspicuous for a quality of goodness which can be explained in part by the fact that the artist himself was a man of deep religious feeling. From the technical point of view he suffered by having come just too late to be able to profit from the sound training he might have received in a studio such as Benjamin West's, and he was too firmly set in his style and had enjoyed too great a popularity to take advantage of the discoveries of the last half of the nineteenth century. He did nevertheless have a good sense of color and in his earlier work a solid way of painting. Among his principal works are: "The Florentine Girl", "Early Christian Prisoners", "The Shepherd Boy of the Campagna", "The Roman Penitents", "Christiana and Her Children", "Queen Mary signing the Death-Warrant of Lady Jane Grey", "Feckenham in the Tower" (1850), "Chocorua" (1860), "Republican Court in the Time of Washington" containing sixty-four careful portraits (1861), "Philosophy and Christian Art" (1868), "Sowing the Word" (1869), "St Jerome, Juliet on the Balcony" (1870), "The Narrows, Lake George" (1871), "Clement VII. and Charles V. at Bologna", "Goldsmiths Daughter" (1884).
He had been elected an associate of the National Academy in 1839 and in the following year he was made an Academician.
He married Harriet Sophia Richards on June 16, 1842.
