National galleria of art was a gift to the American People from financier Andrew Mellon who served as treasury secretary until 1932. Up next, we visit the museum to learn about early american portrait painting and the work of John Singleton copley. Dianne hello. I am dianne stevens. We are standing in a room full of portraits by John Singleton copley, americas most important colonial portrait painter. I think as we look around the room, you can think back to the words of john adams, 1817, who said when you see his portraits, you want a discourse with him. You want to ask him questions and receive answers. Let me give you some background. In the early part of the 18th century, early american painters without much background and training made ambitious but tentative efforts to capture likenesses on canvas because portraiture was really the only way to do that. It was the most important type of painting in the colonies. There was a great flourishing of activity that became elevated to a l
Massachusetts merchant and political figure. He was 82 when this was painted. Copleys shown him just as he was. Youll notice the way hes painted the face and the hands is a little different. This is 12 years later. Copleys changed his technique, so the hands are painted with al little bit more fluid paint and in the face as well. Its easier to show the details, so copley is changing and developing as he goes along through his career in boston. Il so copleys portraits of men po show you these very substantial realistic figures that look ial comfortable in their setting an you have a sense that they had, these two men especially, that , theyve had successful lives and theyre in a good place. His paintings of women sometimee are just so ravishingly beautiful in their attention to fabric and texture and the o beauty of the skin, like this portrait of Anne Fairchild bowler. Ms. Metcalfe bowler. This was painted in 1763, so about the same time he was proac painting epes sergeant, but its a t
Comfortable. Copley has given us more than just a representation of his features, but we have a sense of his status and his feeling about himself. Hes painted copley has a great attention to detail. He doesnt leave anything out. Hes got the mole under epes left eye is there. His somewhat wrinkled skin is portrayed just as it is. The fact hes bursting his jacket, hes filling out his jacket anyway, is evident. The hand he has in front of him, i think, gilbert stuart, the american painter, said later about that hand if you prick that hand, blood will spurt out. Its so realistically painted with no effort to make it pretty. Here you see that epes is leaning on an antique column, and there probably werent many of those in the colonies in the 1760s. Copley gets much much of his training comes from the fact that his stepfather was an engraver and this compositional idea probably came from that. I love to look at this just a little bit. It must be his waistcoat showing through. Hes dressed for
Dedicated on march 17th, 1941, the National Gallery of art was a gift to the American People from financier andrew melon. Up next, we visit the museum to learn about early american portrait painting and the work of John Singleton copley. Hello. Im Dianne Stephens from the education department, the National Gallery of art. Were standing in a room full of portraits by John Singleton copley, americas most important colonial portrait painter. You can thi you want to ask them questions and receive answers. I dont think you can say it much better than that. Let me give you a little background. In the early part of the 18th century in america, early painters without much background and much training, we call them the limbners, made ambitious but tentative efforts to capture likenesses on canvas because portraiture was the only way of doing that those days and it was really the most important type of painting in the colonies. It was with John Singleton copley and john west that there was a gre
Tract, which was given to lord fairfax and the borden track south of that. But huge holdings. And then those members of the aristocrats that owned those lands were to settle it within a certain number of people within a certain number of years. So there was a lot of finangling of land and difficulties in people acquiring title. But meeting with the surveyor and finding a vacant piece of land and coming back with the guide and seeing if that property was available for purchase. And then prices of course varied depending on whether it was good bottom land or upland or whatever. But there were problems many times in acquiring final title. There were overlapping claims an you read about somebody might improve a piece of property and then some years later find it is claimed by somebody else. That was not infrequent. At that time, in the 18th century, north of us, what is Rockingham County and north, would have had a larger number of folks from germany, which this area which is now augusta c