The Dean's Roll Call

At every commencement of Jefferson Medical College in Philadelphia, the dean stood up and read out the names of the new doctors. From the 1880s, for about 30 years, that dean was James William Holland, a Tennessean who taught medical chemistry, and in 1899 Eakins asked him to pose for a full-length portrait doing exactly that. Holland stands in his academic gown with its green trim, feet planted wide, a yellow portfolio with the roll of names open in his hands. The canvas is more than two metres tall.

The sittings began around January and went on for two months or more. Holland's son later wrote to the museum that his father was never strong and was worn out by that point in the year, and that Eakins made him hold the full standing pose under the skylight, refusing to let him sit down even while he worked on the head. The face came out tense, almost haggard. Eakins had hoped the college would buy the portrait. It declined, and later commissioned a likeness of Holland from another Philadelphia painter, Adolphe Borie. In 1900 Eakins gave his canvas to Mrs. Holland, and in 1943 her children sold it to the Museum of Fine Arts, the first full-length portrait by Eakins to enter the collection.