Charles Goddard Weld (1857–1911) was a

Boston Boston is the capital and most populous city in the Commonwealth (U.S. state), Commonwealth of Massachusetts in the United States. The city serves as the cultural and Financial centre, financial center of New England, a region of the Northeas ...

-area physician, sailor, and philanthropist. Weld, a resident of

Brookline, Massachusetts Brookline () is an affluent town in Norfolk County, Massachusetts, United States, and part of the Greater Boston, Boston metropolitan area. An exclave of Norfolk County, Brookline borders six of Boston's neighborhoods: Brighton, Boston, Brighton ...

, and a scion of the Welds of that area, practiced surgery for many years, but ultimately gave it up to manage his family's fortune. He made major contributions to two museums in

Greater Boston Greater Boston is the metropolitan region of New England encompassing the municipality of Boston, the capital of the U.S. state of Massachusetts and the most populous city in New England, and its surrounding areas, home to 4,941,632. The most s ...

Museum of Fine Arts Contributions

Weld is donated his the collection of

Ernest Fenollosa Ernest Francisco Fenollosa (February 18, 1853 – September 21, 1908) was an American art historian of Japanese art, professor of philosophy and political economy at Tokyo Imperial University. An important educator during the modernization of Japa ...

for the

Museum of Fine Arts, Boston The Museum of Fine Arts (often abbreviated as MFA Boston or MFA) is an art museum in Boston, Massachusetts. It is the list of largest art museums, 20th-largest art museum in the world, measured by public gallery area. It contains 8,161 painting ...

. The museum contains one of the largest collections of Japanese art outside Japan, numbering over 100,000 objects. In 1886, Weld attempted to sail around the world in his personal yacht. However, while moored in

Yokohama is the List of cities in Japan, second-largest city in Japan by population as well as by area, and the country's most populous Municipalities of Japan, municipality. It is the capital and most populous city in Kanagawa Prefecture, with a popu ...

, the yacht caught fire and was destroyed. As a result, Weld spent an extended amount of time with his Bostonian friends

William Sturgis Bigelow William Sturgis Bigelow (April 4, 1850 in Boston, MassachusettsBIGELOW, William Stur ...

and Ernest Fenollosa. The pair had already been in Japan for some time themselves, exploring the country and collecting art. The Fenollosa-Weld Collection contains many of the most famous pieces in the Museum of Fine Arts' collection. Among them is a handscroll painting (''

emaki Illustrated handscrolls, , or is an illustrated horizontal narration system of painted handscrolls that dates back to Nara-period (710–794 CE) Japan. Initially copying their much older Chinese counterparts in style, during the succeeding He ...

'') depicting the 1159 Night Attack on the Sanjō Palace. Others are famous pieces by Sesshū,

Kanō Eitoku was a Japanese painter who lived during the Azuchi–Momoyama period of Japanese history and one of the most prominent patriarchs of the Kanō school of Japanese painting. Life and works Born in Kyoto, Eitoku was the grandson of Kanō Motonob ...

, and

Kanō Hōgai Kanō Hōgai (狩野芳崖, February 27, 1828 – October 5, 1888) was a Japanese painter of the Kanō school. Life The son of the local daimyō's chief painter, he was sent at the age of 18 to Edo to study painting formally. He stayed there fo ...

. While Fenollosa and Bigelow developed very widespread and inclusive tastes in art during their time in Japan, Weld's interests remained somewhat narrowly focused. His primary interests in life were sport, boating, and martial activities such as archery. As a result, he became one of the first Americans to collect Japanese swords, spears, and other martial implements as art. In addition to full swords, Weld purchased many sword ornaments, handguards (''

tsuba Japanese sword mountings are the various housings and associated fittings (''Commons:Tosogu (Japanese sword fittings), tosogu'') that hold the blade of a Japanese sword when it is being worn or stored. refers to the ornate mountings of a Japane ...

''), and other sword fittings such as '' kozuka'', tiny blades tied to a swordhilt and used by the samurai for basic utilitarian tasks. In 1911, the collections of Ernest Fenollosa and Charles G. Weld, much of it already physically in the Museum of Fine Arts, on loan indefinitely, became the property of the Museum, as the Fenollosa-Weld Collection.

Peabody Essex Museum Contributions

Weld also made major contributions to the

Peabody Essex Museum The Peabody Essex Museum (PEM) in Salem, Massachusetts, US, is a successor to the East India Marine Society, established in 1799. It combines the collections of the former Peabody Museum of Salem (which acquired the Society's collection) and th ...

. Included among these are 110

photographs A photograph (also known as a photo, or more generically referred to as an ''image'' or ''picture'') is an image created by light falling on a photosensitive surface, usually photographic film or an electronic image sensor. The process and pra ...

that premier

American American(s) may refer to: * American, something of, from, or related to the United States of America, commonly known as the "United States" or "America" ** Americans, citizens and nationals of the United States of America ** American ancestry, p ...

photographer

Edward S. Curtis Edward Sheriff Curtis (February 19, 1868 – October 19, 1952; sometimes given as Edward Sherriff Curtis) was an American photographer and ethnologist whose work focused on the American West and Native American people. Sometimes referred to a ...

made for his 1905-1906 exhibit. Clark Worswick, curator of photography for the museum, describes them as:

"...Curtis' most carefully selected prints of what was then his life’s work...certainly these are some of the most glorious prints ever made in the history of the photographic medium. The fact that we have this man’s entire show of 1906 is one of the minor miracles of photography and museology."Peabody Essex Museum: The Master Prints of Edwards S. Curtis

The 14" by 17" prints are each unique and remain in pristine condition.

References

Bibliography

*"A History of the Asiatic Department: A Series of Illustrated Lectures Given in 1957 by Kojiro Tomita (1890-1976)."

, 1990.

External links

Museum of Fine Arts, Boston main site
{{DEFAULTSORT:Weld, Charles Goddard American art collectors 1857 births 1911 deaths People from Brookline, Massachusetts Museum of Fine Arts, Boston Harvard University alumni