Mystery Painting Prompts Search for Answers

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Byline: Karen McCowan The Register-Guard

HE'S RESCUED the painting not once, but twice. Now that it's again on public display, political consultant and activist Scott Bartlett would like some help from the public.

He's sleuthing for some answers: Who were Ferris and Goethe, the artists who signed it? For what public location was it commissioned? And where is the setting of the lovers' picnic it depicts?

The restored, 5-foot-by-8-foot painting was formally unveiled by County Commissioner Bill Dwyer last month. (Dwyer joined Bartlett and others in underwriting the repair, remounting and reframing of the painting.)

Painted in a water-based tempera, it depicts a young couple in a mountaintop meadow against a …