5 CONCLUSIONS

Through this limited study of individual paintings, it is possible to appreciate the wide range of incised textures in 19th-century American portraits on panel. With the exception of Waldo and Jewett's Portrait of a Man, the scoring patterns examined are all clearly visible to the naked eye and serve a definite decorative function. There are variations in pattern and methods of application, even within the oeuvre of a particular painter. More data collection is necessary to establish the full extent of the use of this technique and whether Gilbert Stuart was the first to initiate it. Eventually, the examination of scoring patterns might be a useful tool in answering questions regarding attribution and authenticity.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

The author would like to thank Marcia Steele, Kenneth B�, and Bruce Robertson for their consistent support and advice. Many thanks to Dean Yoder, who brought the Stuart panel William Codman to my attention and spent much time discussing the markings. Thanks also go to the others who helped in correspondence and discussion: Marcia Goldberg, Annette Blaugrund, Alexander Katlan, Mark Bockrath, Anne Hoenigswald, Ross Merrill, and Stephen Wolffe. Photography in this article is by Matthew Kocsis, courtesy of the Cleveland Museum of Art, except figure 9, which is courtesy of the National Gallery of Art.