# Portrait of a Gentleman

- By: Alvan Clark (born Ashfield, MA 1804-died Cambridge, MA 1887)
- Date: 1836-1844
- Medium: watercolor on ivory in a sterling silver frame
- Classification: Paintings
- Dimensions: image: 3 x 2 3/8 in. (7.7 x 6.1 cm) oval
- Credit line: Smithsonian American Art Museum, Museum purchase through the Catherine Walden Myer Fund
- Museum: [Smithsonian Institution](https://americanart.si.edu/collections/search/artwork/?id=4896)
- Rights: [CC0 (Smithsonian Open Access)](https://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/)
- Picture: https://invisiblenetwork.ai/thumbs/web/036a6ec681d69e6d9209f140a004e6cf.jpg
- Who can see it: Tweens profiles and older (museums give no ratings; placed by Invisible Network from the museum's own words)

This unknown gentleman is wearing a wide-collared frock coat and white satin cravat. In 1837, the Gentleman’s Magazine of Fashion described a white cravat as “almost indispensable in full dress” and it was sometimes tied to cover the entire shirtfront.