The Village Lamplighter

Generously provided by New Mexico Museum of Art

From 1916 on, well into the mid-1920s, Sharp explored a number of similarly composed scenes set just outside his home looking west along Kit Carson Road toward downtown Taos. Most of these views pictured Crucita and other Pueblo Indian models like Francisco or Leaf Down standing by the artist’s front gate, watching other Indians as they sauntered by. (Record 46 and related images 46a)

In a departure during the mid-1920s, Sharp produced two unique paintings, The Santo Mender and The Chemayo Weaver, that celebrated Hispanic craftsmen working at their trades. (Record 33 and related image 33a) In this canvas, The Village Lamplighter, Sharp combined the two visions of the streetscape and the Hispanic worker, portraying a fatigued elderly Hispanic gentleman who takes shelter in the niche provided by the artist’s blue front gate. There he rests his weary knees by sitting on the ladder that he uses to reach the town’s gas lamps and bring light to Kit Carson Road. Dusk is settling on the narrow muddy street, so the workman cannot linger long from his evening toils.

Peter H. Hassrick

Artist: Joseph Henry Sharp
Date: ca. 1925; [n.d.]
Catalogue Number: 593
Medium: oil on canvas
Inscriptions: LR: J.H.SHARP.

Dimensions: 25 x 30 in.
Credit Line: New Mexico Museum of Art, Santa Fe, NM
Accession Number: 4.23P
Subjects: Kit Carson Road, Taos, gate

The artist; [?]; Julius Gans; present owner by gift, 1945

There are no known records of a work by this title, but it relates to several paintings produced in about 1925 that picture Kit Carson Road in front of Sharp's home and studio. (Record 46 and related image 46a)

The Village Lamplighter

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