Painting in the Lobby of the Philadelphia Museum of Art
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Philadelphia Museum of Fine art Deaccessions Ix Paintings to Acquire Rare Early 19th Century Portrait of an African American by Charles Willson Peale
- PHILADELPHIA, Pennsylvania
- /
- October 24, 2011
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The Philadelphia Museum of Fine art has caused the painting Yarrow Mamout, 1819, an exceptionally rare portrait of an African-American by Charles Willson Peale (1741-1827), one of the most renowned American artists of the late 18th and early 19th centuries. Depicting an anile homo who had been built-in in Guinea in western Africa, taken into slavery in the American colonies and later manumitted, or freed by his possessor, information technology is one of the very earliest known works to describe a freed slave in the United States and the earliest known painting of a Muslim in America. Upon its completion, Yarrow Mamout was exhibited at Peale'southward Museum, in Independence Hall in Philadelphia, where it could exist seen alongside other works by the creative person and his son Rembrandt that represented George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Benjamin Franklin, Lewis and Clark, David Rittenhouse, and many other achieved individuals. Measuring 24 10 20 inches, this new acquisition has today been placed on view at the Philadelphia Museum of Fine art, just off the Bully Stair Hall in the first gallery toward the American Wing. Information technology has been purchased from the Philadelphia History Museum at the Atwater Kent.
"The name Charles Willson Peale is closely associated with Philadelphia's prominence as the leading creative center in belatedly 18th- and early 19th-century America," said Timothy Rub, the George D. Widener Director and Chief Executive Officer of the Philadelphia Museum of Art. "Although Peale'southward work is well represented in our drove, his portrait of Yarrow Mamout is distinctive by virtue of the fact that it is 1 of the earliest and certainly one of the virtually sympathetic portraits of an African-American to be found in the history of American fine art. Peale was specially drawn to this remarkable man, not only considering of his advanced age (he was reputed to be 140 years old) but also considering of his remarkable personal history: a freed slave who had accomplished prosperity and was well known to the citizens of Washington, D.C., where the artist painted this portrait. It is an infrequent painting that tells an equally exceptional story."
The Honorable Michael Nutter, Mayor of Philadelphia, stated: "This portrait depicts a man who triumphed over enormous challenges and allowable the respect and admiration of all who knew him. Cheers to the Philadelphia Museum of Art information technology is a neat affair that such an extraordinary painting will remain hither and so that it can continue to serve as an inspiration for all of our citizens. That its sale volition provide much-needed resources for the Philadelphia History Museum, as well equally the Historical Society of Pennsylvania, which shares in the proceeds of the sale, is what I would call a win for all of these dandy institutions and for our metropolis."
Peale'south Museum, which is widely acknowledged past historians to take been the outset museum in the United States, occupied the upper floors and belfry of Independence Hall from 1802 until 1827. In 1854, when its collections were dispersed, the portrait of Yarrow Mamout was misidentified and auctioned every bit "Washington's retainer" to Charles S. Ogden, who donated the film to the Historical Club of Pennsylvania in 1892. The painting entered the collection of the Philadelphia History Museum in 1999 when it received by transfer much of the HSP'southward collection of fine art and artifacts. Peale was almost 80 years old when he went to Washington, D.C., to lobby for federal funding for his museum and to paint "portraits of distinguished public characters" such every bit Andrew Jackson, John Quincy Adams, and Henry Clay for his portrait gallery. Along with his dedication to healthy habits, Peale had a bang-up and constant interest in longevity, and while in Washington he heard of a erstwhile slave said to be nearly 140 years old. Peale went out of his way to detect and pigment Yarrow Mamout at the home that Mamout owned in Georgetown. Modern research shows that Mamout, a Muslim from Guinea and literate in Arabic, was taken into bondage in the colonies about 1752 and freed after 45 years in slavery. He was not as former as Peale believed him to be, but his sprightly condition at such an advanced age (probably well-nigh 83) was remarkable for this period. His proper noun, perhaps more correctly given in W Africa every bit Mahmoud Yaro, is one of many variant spellings of the name of the prophet Mohammed. His knit cap, serving to keep him warm during Peale's mid-winter portrait session, may as well represent headgear from the region of Africa from which he came. Peale'southward diary describes Yarrow Mamout every bit a cheerful human notable for his "manufacture, frugality, and sobriety," and observes: "He professes to be a Mahometan, and is often seen and heard in the streets singing praises to God-- and, conversing with him, he said human being is no good unless his faith comes from his centre."
The Philadelphia Museum of Art owns the about comprehensive collection of works by Charles Willson Peale and his legendary family of artists, including his brother James, his sons Raphaelle, Rembrandt, and Titian, and his numerous grandchildren. "This painting adds a new dimension to our collection of Peale'due south piece of work at the end of his life, when he enjoyed a spectacular artistic renaissance," said Kathleen A. Foster, the Robert Fifty. McNeil Jr. Senior Curator of American Art. "Peale brought a lifetime of good and compassionate observation to comport on his representation of Yarrow Mamout, who returns his gaze warmly, with an expression of wisdom, patience, and a twinkle of solidarity in his eyes. We find information technology wonderful that Peale so esteemed Yarrow and added his portrait to the gallery of distinguished individuals in his museum."
Paintings of African-American subjects by American artists are rare before 1820. The 3 finest and best-known in oil are Copley's vivacious Caput of a Negro (Detroit Institute of Arts) painted in England in 1777-78, perhaps equally a study for Watson and the Shark; the portrait of the 1790s said to describe George Washington'southward enslaved melt, Hercules, and attributed to Gilbert Stuart (Museo Thyssen-Bornemisza, Madrid); and Peale's charismatic paradigm of Yarrow Mamout. The merely earlier portrait known to survive of a freed slave in America is that of the distinguished Reverend Absalom Jones, painted on paper eight years before the portrait of Yarrow Mamout, past Peale'due south son Raphaelle (Delaware Art Museum).
The Education Department of the Philadelphia Museum of Art, which draws some eighty,000 school students to the Museum each yr, in detail from the Philadelphia Public Schools, is preparing a teaching poster dedicated to the portrait of Yarrow Mamout that will be distributed to classrooms throughout the region. Marla Shoemaker, the Kathleen C. Sherrerd Senior Curator of Education, stated: "This beautiful portrait reminds students and all of us of the many diverse people who helped to build our nation. Yarrow Mamout'south dignity and warmth, equally portrayed past an artist who clearly admired him, will captivate and inspire students of all racial, indigenous, and religious backgrounds."
In order to purchase this unique painting in Peale'southward oeuvre, the Philadelphia Museum of Art is deaccessioning nine works from its collection of American art. 5 paintings will be sold in New York on November xxx through auction at Christies, whose Chairman, Marc Porter, helped advise the Philadelphia History Museum on the sale of the Peale portrait. The remaining works, including two chairs and two Charles Willson Peale portraits, will be sold at a later on engagement. The deaccessioned works are:
Portrait of a Lady, ca. 1915, William Merritt Hunt
Mrs. John Bayard (Margaret Hodge), 1780, Charles Willson Peale
Col. John B. Bayard, 1781, Charles Willson Peale
Caput of a Girl in a Hat with a Black Rosette, n.d., Mary Stevenson Cassatt
Italy, ca. 1872-74, George Inness
Evening Landscape, ca. 1868, George Inness
Still Life with Fruit, ca. 1850-lxx, Severin Roesen
Side Chair, ca. 1755-1760, artist/maker unknown, carved past Nicholas Bernard, Philadelphia
Side Chair, ca. 1765-75, creative person maker unknown, Philadelphia
The Portrait Collection of the Peale Museum at Independence Hall
In 1782, Charles Willson Peale added a 66 foot-long gallery to his abode at Third and Pino Streets in Philadelphia. It was the offset sky-lit gallery in America, and by 1784 Peale was on his way to launching a formal portrait collection of prominent gimmicky American armed services and civilian leaders. Over time he expanded the collection to include scientists, explorers, artists, and other American and European men of achievement. In 1786 Peale joined this drove with his newly conceived museum of natural history, and founded Peale'southward Philadelphia Museum, which moved to Philosophical Hall in 1794 before expanding into Independence Hallin 1802. Portraits in the collection were painted about entirely by Charles and his son Rembrandt. While near were bosom portraits presented in gilt frames with oval inserts surrounding the paradigm, there was likewise a selection of full-length portraits that included his 1779 portrait of Washington at Princeton and his 1795 double portrait of his sons, Raphaelle and Titian, now known as the Staircase Grouping (Philadelphia Museum of Art). Other famous individuals whose portraits were in the extensive collection past the time Yarrow Mamout'southward portrait was added included Martha Washington, Jefferson, Franklin, Anthony Wayne (McNeil Collection; promised gift to Philadelphia Museum of Art), Thomas Wharton (Philadelphia Museum of Fine art), John Paul Jones (Independence National Celebrated Park), inventors David Rittenhouse (INHP) and Robert Fulton (INHP), naturalist William Bartram (INHP), philosopher and scientist Joseph Priestly, builder Benjamin Henry Latrobe (INHP), portraitist Gilbert Stuart, explorers Lewis and Clark, French sculptor Jean Antoine Houdon (Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts), painter Angelica Kauffman, and the priest and advocate of racial equality Henri Gregoire.
Most the Peale collection at the Philadelphia Museum of Art
The Museum's collection now includes over 150 objects past America'south kickoff artistic dynasty, including of import contempo gifts and promised gifts from Robert L. McNeil, Jr. Representing all aspects of the Peale family unit'south work, the Museum'due south holdings include many portraits, from ambitious life-size images in oil to small jewel-similar miniatures, drawings, engravings, and cutting-paper silhouettes. Landscapes and works demonstrating the family unit'due south engagement with diverse aspects of natural science accompany a rich pick of withal life pictures past the genre'southward kickoff American masters, Raphaelle and James Peale. According to Carol Soltis, Project Acquaintance Curator in American Fine art and author of the forthcoming publication on the collection, The Art of the Peales: Adaptations and Innovations, this is "a collection that showcases both the individual excellence and the communal interests of the Peales as they sought to answer to and shape the evolving tastes and interests of their American audience."
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