History painting The term history painting was introduced in the seventeenth century to describe paintings with subject matter drawn from classical history …. You might like Left Right. Benjamin West — James Barry — Gilbert Stuart — John Hamilton Mortimer — Sir Nathaniel Dance-Holland — Henry Fuseli — Sir Joshua Reynolds — Robert Smirke — His famous Liberty Bowl stands on a platform just in front of it, like a chalice proffered by a preacher.
In the s, the churchiness of the presentation was franker; the portrait and the bowl were placed upon a pedestal with a couple of steps before it, suitable for genuflecting, flanked by American and Massachusetts flags.
But even today, in a new and less earnest century, Paul Revere forms the center panel of an American altarpiece. Behind Revere, on the left, hang a quartet of his fellow revolutionaries.
John Hancock, the stalwart merchant, sits at his desk, reckoning, the quill that will ink his bold signature on the Declaration of Independence poised in his right hand. Joseph Warren, the physician, pores over a set of anatomical drawings that seem to prefigure his death and resurrection as the martyr of Bunker Hill.
The portraits were painted separately, in the s and early s, tumultuous years in the world beyond their gilded frames. Viewed together centuries later, in the chilly splendor of a great museum, through the glaring light of hindsight, they become a patriotic pantheon: American originals, painted by another of their breed.
A cautious man in a rash age, John Singleton Copley feared the onrush of the colonial rebellion against Great Britain. And like many people who had lived through civil wars before him, and who have endured them since, he thought the safest side was no side at all.
Copley painted John Hancock, whom he knew well and grew to despise. But by the time Hancock signed the Declaration, the painter was long gone from the country that document called into being. He would never set foot in the United States. British museums, which own the greatest of his works, classify him differently. Such tales, for all their drama, are ultimately flat: morality plays etched in black and white, as if by engravers who have only ink and paper to depict all the shades of a subject.
But like the paintings Copley produced so painstakingly, the revolutionary world was awash in an almost infinite spectrum of color. Allegiance came in many shades. Some pigments were durable, others fugitive and shifting.
Carter recalls telling his companion, "I have taken as much pains as to the mode of conveying you as if you had been my wife, and I cannot help telling you that she, though a delicate little woman, accommodated her feelings to her situation with more temper than you have done".
Regardless of these interpersonal complications, Copley finally saw works by Old Masters , though he found himself surprisingly disappointed. Still, looking through hundreds of works in Italy, he nevertheless found the framework to experiment in new "European" ways. As the Revolutionary War in America inched nearer, Copley urged his wife and their children to leave Boston and meet him in London, which they did in Although this period is not considered Copley's most productive, he did manage to begin his first historical painting and to receive an invitation to become a member of the prestigious Royal Academy of Arts.
His historical scenes showcased a commitment to psychological portraiture - his trademark - combined with an interest in historical scenes. Despite the happiness of being reunited as a family, the Copleys struggled in London. The difficult political situation meant that his assets were stuck in Boston.
Although Benjamin West tried his best to secure Copley commissions, Copley struggled to earn enough to adequately support his family.
The necessity to earn a living wage convinced him that continuing with his overly-honest American style would not do and he tried to paint in the style that was fashionable. He produced works that, while not especially popular with British academicians and elites, are now considered seminal works in the artist's oeuvre. At this time he also set important precedents when it came to putting on private exhibitions outside of the Royal Academy and marketing reproductions of his own work.
As Carrie Rebora Barratt of the Metropolitan Museum of Art put it, "the possession of works of art - especially English-style pictures - by an artist as accomplished as Copley was of immeasurable social value. Typically displayed in the halls, parlors, and dining rooms of homes decorated with Chippendale-style furniture, Rococo tea sets, and other fine things, Copley's portraits became centerpieces in the stagecraft of elite, eighteenth-century life". The tide of personal fortune changed for Copley in when the Earl of Chatham had a stroke while addressing the House of Commons.
The painting he created of the event brought him significant commercial success, temporarily alleviating his financial burdens. This, however, did not keep the artist from feeling homesick. Nor could he escape his financial struggles since the art market in Britain declined in the shadow of the French Revolution, the war with France declared by France in February , followed by the Irish rebellion in , and a continued decline into the Napoleonic era. The last fifteen years of his life are described as unhappy.
His student H. Morse recalls his tutor as being generally combative and irritable. Fortunately, his wife and children managed to physically and financially assist him, even after his first stroke at the age of 78 left him fully paralyzed on his left side.
A second stroke, however, left him fully incapacitated. In his biography, his son writes that in moments of clarity, Copley would speak of his readiness to pass away, likely due to his inability to paint anymore.
The artist died shortly after his second stroke on September 9, History has shown Copley to be the greatest, and most influential, American colonial painter; his fastidious attention to picture detail coming to define the realist tradition of American art.
His legacy stretched throughout the nineteenth century influencing the fastidious luminist style of Fitz Henry Lane and the precise trompe l'oeil still lifes of William Harnett. Having relocated to London Copley continued with his sophisticated portraiture but his greatest gift to his adopted country was his contribution to the development of contemporary history painting to which he brought a dynamic blend of theater and detail.
Public recognition of his significance to early American history is evidenced through spaces like Copley Square in Boston, and a 5-cent stamp produced by the USPS in bearing one of his paintings. Content compiled and written by Ximena Kilroe. Edited and revised, with Summary and Accomplishments added by Antony Todd.
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