The Letter

Albert Sands Southworth and Josiah Johnson Hawes

National Gallery of Art

Two pale-skinned women wearing full, floor-length dresses sit angled to our left at the center of this vertical black and white photograph. The woman to our left sits on a patterned carpet wearing a black dress and holding an unfolded piece of paper in her lap. The woman to our right is wrapped in a patterned shawl worn over a lighter colored dress, and she leans against the shoulder of the woman to our left. Both look into the distance to our left. There is a chair upholstered with a floral-patterned fabric in the background to our left and a side table holding a bonnet, the ribbons falling over the edge, to our right. The women are mostly in focus and the rest of the room is a bit blurry, out of focus.