Gilbert Stuart | |
|---|---|
 Portrait bySarah Goodridge,c. 1825 | |
| Born | Gilbert Stewart[1] (1755-12-03)December 3, 1755 Saunderstown, Colony of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations, British America |
| Died | July 9, 1828(1828-07-09) (aged 72) Boston, Massachusetts, U.S. |
| Known for | Painting |
| Notable work | George Washington (TheAthenaeum Portrait) (1796) George Washington (Lansdowne portrait) (1796) George Washington (Vaughan portrait) (1795) The Skater (1782) Catherine Brass Yates (1794) John Adams (1824) |
Gilbert Stuart (néStewart; December 3, 1755 – July 9, 1828) was an American painter born in theRhode Island Colony who is widely considered one of America's foremost portraitists.[2] His best-known work is an unfinished portrait ofGeorge Washington, begun in 1796, which is usually referred to as theAthenaeum Portrait. Stuart retained the original and used it to paint scores of copies that were commissioned by patrons in America and abroad. The image of George Washington featured in the painting has appeared on theUnited States one-dollar bill for more than a century[2] and on variouspostage stamps of the 19th century and early 20th century.[3]
Stuart produced portraits of about 1,000 people, including thefirst six Presidents.[4] His work can be found today at art museums throughout the United States and the United Kingdom, including theMetropolitan Museum of Art andFrick Collection inNew York City, theNational Gallery of Art inWashington, D.C., thePhiladelphia Museum of Art inPhiladelphia, theNational Portrait Gallery inWashington D.C., theNational Portrait Gallery inLondon, England, theWorcester Art Museum inWorcester, Massachusetts, and theBoston Museum of Fine Arts.[5]
Stuart was born on December 3, 1755, inSaunderstown, a village ofNorth Kingstown in theColony of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations, and he was baptized atOld Narragansett Church on April 11, 1756.[6][7] He was the third child of Gilbert Stuart,[8] a Scottish immigrant employed in thesnuff-making industry, and Elizabeth Anthony Stuart, a member of a prominent land-owning family fromMiddletown, Rhode Island.[4] Stuart's father owned the first snuff mill in America, which was located in the basement of the family homestead.[9]
Stuart moved toNewport, Rhode Island, at the age of six, where his father pursued work in the merchant field. In Newport, he first began to show great promise as a painter.[10] In 1770, he made the acquaintance of Scottish artistCosmo Alexander, a visitor to the colonies who made portraits of local patrons and who became a tutor to Stuart.[11][12] Under the guidance of Alexander, Stuart painted the portraitDr. Hunter's Spaniels when he was 14; it hangs today in theHunter House Mansion in Newport.[7]
In 1771, Stuart moved to Scotland with Alexander to finish his studies; however, Alexander died inEdinburgh one year later. Stuart tried to maintain a living and pursue his painting career, but to no avail, so he returned to Newport in 1773.[13]
Stuart's prospects as a portraitist were jeopardized by the onset of theAmerican Revolution and its social disruptions. Although he was apatriot,[14] he departed for England in 1775 following the example set byJohn Singleton Copley.[15] His painting style during this period began to develop beyond the relatively hard-edged and linear style that he had learned from Alexander.[16] He was unsuccessful at first in pursuit of his vocation, but he became a protégé ofBenjamin West in 1777 and studied with him for the next six years. The relationship was beneficial, with Stuart exhibiting for the first time at theRoyal Academy in spring of 1777.[17]
By 1782, Stuart had met with success, largely due to acclaim forThe Skater, a portrait ofSir William Grant. It was Stuart's first full-length portrait and, according to a rival, it belied the prevailing opinion that Stuart "made a tolerable likeness of a face, but as to the figure, he could not get below the fifth button'".[18] Stuart said that he was "suddenly lifted into fame by a single picture".[19]
The prices for his pictures were exceeded only by those of renowned English artistsJoshua Reynolds andThomas Gainsborough. Despite his many commissions, however, he was habitually neglectful of finances and was in danger of being sent todebtors' prison. In 1787, he fled to Dublin, Ireland where he painted and accumulated debt with equal vigor.[20]
Stuart ended his 18-year stay in Britain and Ireland in 1793, leaving behind numerous unfinished paintings. He returned to the United States with a particular goal of painting a portrait ofGeorge Washington and having an engraver reproduce it and provide for his family through the engraving's sale.[21] He settled briefly in New York City and pursued portrait commissions from influential people who could bring him to Washington's attention.[17] In 1794, he painted statesmanJohn Jay, from whom he received a letter of introduction to Washington. In 1795, Stuart moved to theGermantown section ofPhiladelphia, where he opened a studio,[22][23] and Washington posed for him later that year.[17]
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Stuart painted Washington in a series of iconic portraits, each of them leading to a demand for copies and keeping him busy and highly paid for years.[24] The most famous and celebrated of these likenesses, theAthenaeum portrait, is portrayed on theUnited States one-dollar bill. Stuart painted about 50 reproductions of it.[25] However, he avoided completing the original version. After finishing Washington's face, he kept it to make copies which he sold for $100 each. Thus, the original portrait remained in its unfinished state at the time of his death in 1828.[26] An engraver at the USBureau of Engraving and Printing,George Frederick Cumming Smillie, made an etching of the painting which was used on multiple banknotes. A vignette of the portrait appears on the 1899 2-dollar silver certificate, and the one dollar note of (1918 to 2023).United States one-dollar bills featured the image for decades (1918 to 2023).[27]
The painting was jointly purchased by theNational Portrait Gallery andMuseum of Fine Arts, Boston in 1980, and is generally on display in the National Portrait Gallery.[28][29]
Another celebrated image of Washington is the full-lengthLansdowne portrait, now in the National Portrait Gallery. Its historical importance is almost matched by an early forgery based on it which was purchased for theWhite House. This painting was rescued during theBurning of Washington in theWar of 1812 thanks to the efforts ofFirst LadyDolley Madison andPaul Jennings, one of PresidentJames Madison'sslaves. Three replicas of the original portrait are accepted as by Stuart.[30] Additional copies were painted by other artists.[31] In 1803, Stuart opened a studio inWashington, D. C.[32]
In 1800, Thomas Jefferson paid Suart $100.00 for a portrait but never received it, because in 1805, Suart painted another portrait of Jefferson over the 1800 portrait. In 1821, Stuart sent a copy of the 1805 portrait to Jefferson the so called "Edgehill" portrait. The original 1805 portrait became part of Jane Stuart collection until it was damaged in a fire in 1853. In 1937, Orland Campbell acquired the 1805 portrait and discovered the truth.[33] In June 1959, Campbell had an exhibit at Amherst College of the 1800/1805 portrait and his reconstruction of the "lost" 1800 portrait.[34] Campbell also published an account "The Lost Portraits of Thomas Jefferson Painted by Gilbert Stuart Recovered and Studied by Orland and Courtney Campbell" (1959).
Stuart moved to Devonshire Street inBoston in 1805, continuing in both critical acclaim and financial troubles.[35] He exhibited works locally atDoggett's Repository[36] andJulien Hall.[37] Predictably, he was sought out for advice by other American artists, such asJohn Trumbull,Thomas Sully,Washington Allston, andJohn Vanderlyn.[18]
Stuart married Charlotte Coates around September 1786; she was 13 years his junior and "exceedingly pretty".[38] They had 12 children, five of whom died by 1815 and two others of whom died in their youth. Their daughterJane (1812–1888) was also a painter. She sold many of his paintings and her replicas of them from her studios in Boston andNewport, Rhode Island.[39] In 2011, she was inducted into theRhode Island Heritage Hall of Fame.[40]
In 1824, Stuart suffered a stroke which left him partially paralyzed, but he continued to paint for two years until his death inBoston on July 9, 1828, at 72.[41] He was buried in theCentral Burial Ground atBoston Common.
Stuart left his family deeply in debt, and his wife and daughters were unable to purchase a grave site. He was, therefore, buried in an unmarked grave which was purchased cheaply from Benjamin Howland, a local carpenter.[42] His family recovered from their financial troubles 10 years later, and they planned to move his body to a family cemetery in Newport. However, they could not remember the exact location of his body, and it was never moved.[43] There is a monument for Stuart, his wife, and their children at theCommon Burying Ground in Newport.[44]
TheBoston Athenæum held a benefit exhibition of Stuart's works in August 1828 in an effort to provide financial aid for his family. More than 250 portraits were lent for this critically acclaimed and well-subscribed exhibition. This also marked the first public showing of hisunfinished 1796Athenæum portrait of Washington.[45]
By the end of his career, Gilbert Stuart had painted the likenesses of more than 1,000 American political and social figures.[46] He was praised for the vitality and naturalness of his portraits, and his subjects found his company agreeable.John Adams said:
Speaking generally, no penance is like having one's picture done. You must sit in a constrained and unnatural position, which is a trial to the temper. But I should like to sit to Stuart from the first of January to the last of December, for he lets me do just what I please, and keeps me constantly amused by his conversation.[47]
Stuart was known for working without the aid of sketches, beginning directly upon the canvas. His approach is suggested by the advice which he gave to his pupilMatthew Harris Jouett: "Never be sparing of colour, load your pictures, but keep your colours as separate as you can. No blending, tis destruction to clear & bea[u]tiful effect."[18] Although this is an exaggeration to avoid muddiness, Stuart's colors were remarkably fresh. At Stuart's best, he had an extraordinary ability to convey the impression of "luminous, transparent flesh" with color coming from beneath. The face seemed to be embued with life, while the beauty of its coloring conveyed a spiritual quality to contemporaries.[48] Although uneven, he could produce astonishingly strong likenesses.[49]
John Henri Isaac Browere created a life mask of Stuart around 1825.[50] In 1940, the U.S. Post Office issued a series of postage stamps called the "Famous Americans Series" commemorating famous artists, authors, inventors, scientists, poets, educators, and musicians. Gilbert Stuart is found on the 1 cent issue in the artists category, along withJames McNeill Whistler,Augustus Saint-Gaudens,Daniel Chester French, andFrederic Remington.
Today, Stuart's birthplace inSaunderstown,Rhode Island, is open to the public as theGilbert Stuart Birthplace and Museum. The birthplace consists of the original house where he was born, with copies of his paintings hanging throughout the house, as well as a separate art gallery in which are displayed several original paintings by both Gilbert Stuart and his daughter Jane. The museum opened in 1931.[51]
Gilbert Stuart's paintings of Washington, Jefferson, and others have served as models for dozens of U.S. postage stamps. Washington's image from the famous portraitThe Athenaeum is probably the most noted example of Stuart's work on postage.
This is a partial list of portraits painted by Stuart.[52]
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![Mrs. Hepzibah [Clarke] Swan, 1808, Museum of Fine Arts, Boston](/mt/?noimg=&dark=on&url=https%3a%2f%2fen.wikipedia.org%2fwiki%2fFile%3aGilbert_Stuart_-_Mrs._James_Swan_(Hepzibah_Clarke)_-_27.539_-_Museum_of_Fine_Arts.jpg)
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![This lithograph of Little Turtle is reputedly based upon a lost portrait by Gilbert Stuart that was destroyed when the British burned Washington in 1814.[56]](/mt/?noimg=&dark=on&url=https%3a%2f%2fen.wikipedia.org%2fwiki%2fFile%3aLittle_Turtle.jpg)
{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: bot: original URL status unknown (link),The Story of Gilbert Stuart. Woonsocket Connection. Retrieved July 25, 2007.
