By Delaney Marrs ’26

Where does one begin the process of updating the website details for the over 1,400 objects in the Blick-Harris Study Collection (BHSC)? My choice: upper left shelf, picture stand. One by one, working through the prints and paintings residing in this corner of the collection, my task is standardizing and expanding their entries in the online catalog. It is a work of thread-pulling, questions answered and continued to be asked, and a good deal of nit-picking.

And, it is work that frustrates my desire to neatly begin and complete the upper left shelf, picture stand before jumping to the matted prints. However, on the shelf, I find a reproduction of a print by English artist and caricaturist, Thomas Rowlandson, and in my search across the room for the other four prints in the BHSC, I discover a print I’m sure I have come across before and, following this thread, learn that it is a sixth Rowlandson reproduction in the collection, lacking attribute to its original artist.

Unlike the rulers with which my neat and orderly mind enjoys correcting current object measurements, threads don’t run in a straight line. It is with a meticulously maintained and color-coded spreadsheet that I attempt to follow where these threads of connections lead, and remain open to deviate to whichever object records most need updating. This was the case as I reoriented my research when updated website details were needed for a wall label for the portrait titled Butler’s Sermons (2020.396) that is squeezed between the wall space above the filing cabinet, decidedly nowhere near my upper left shelf, picture stand.

The dealer who originally sold Butler’s Sermons to David P. Harris before its accession into the BHSC identified the sitter as English poet and satirist, Samuel Butler (1612–1680)—it seems they may have found the wrong Butler. It was the hair of the sitter that incited the initial suspicion—neatly rounded off near the neck and bearing little in resemblance to Samuel Butler’s curly locks set free to tumble over his shoulders, as seen in known depictions of him.

Here, my research led me to adding another name to the painting: Joseph Butler (1692–1752). His known depictions show a preference for the rounded, white hairstyle. He was also a philosopher, theologian, and Bishop of Durham from 1750–1752, a more likely candidate to be wearing clerical robes, as the sitter does, than the Samuel Butler known for his mock-heroic Hudibras satirizing a Presbyterian knight.

My update to the website noted that this sitter, positioned in front of a volume that reads “Butler’s Sermons,” might depict Joseph Butler instead, known for his Fifteen Sermons Preached at the Rolls Chapel. This identification also adjusted the potential date of creation for the piece from ca. 1680 to ca. 1750.

This is a short narrative of my exploration of the backstory of an artwork. I treat dealers with suspicion and fact-check dates and sitters. I compare hairstyles and research 18th century clerical robes.

I also convert erroneous hyphens connecting years to en-dashes, attempt to decipher faded signatures and the marks on the backs of paintings (underappreciated beauties boasting stickers galore), email museums in Norfolk, England, and contact Kenyon professors for their expertise.

My work with the BHSC gives me the opportunity to learn from a wide array of objects and people. I now know the logo of the National Museum of the Philippines and the family tree of Scottish painter Alexander Nasmyth (1758–1840). However, all of these little details are both the product of and contribute to my developing of strategies for maximizing my research. This is research I then organize alongside my notes on standardizing the BHSC website. And keeping organized is what allows me to shift across the collection, to whichever object needs updated details or to which I am guided by my research.

However, what I love most is asking questions in the hope of finding new questions (though, answers are also welcome). My research is dedicated to making the BHSC’s website an encouraging place for further research. It very often produces more questions than it answers, but I hope that the details I find keep loosening threads for future exploration.

Delaney Marrs ’26 is a sophomore and double major in Art History and English. LinkedIn