buff photos on Flickr

Shown from the knees up, a light-skinned man and woman are seated side-by-side on grassy rise in a landscape in this horizontal portrait painting. To our left, the man leans heavily toward the woman to our right, propped on one elbow near her hip. She sits upright, resting one hand over his forearm and wrist. The cleanshaven man looks at her with blue eyes under gray, arched brows. He has a straight nose, round cheeks, a hint of a double chin, and his pale pink lips are closed in a slight smile. He wears a forest-green coat, a white waistcoat embroidered with golden yellow, a white shirt and ruffled tie, and buff-colored breaches. His right hand, to our left, is propped loosely against his hip. Next to that hand, a green parrot stands with its wings lifted as it turns its head back over its body. The man’s other hand, near the woman, holds a long, wooden telescope. The woman looks off into the distance to our left with gray eyes. She has smooth cheeks, a delicate nose, and her pink lips also curl in a faint smile. A strand of pearls weaves through the brown hair loosely piled on her head and through the thick curls that fall over her shoulders. Her white dress is loosely draped around her body. An ocean-blue sash with gold stripes and fringe wraps around her waist, and a sprig of pink flowers is tucked into a fold at her neckline. She holds at least three peaches and a stem of leaves in her lap, and a spray of purple clover blossoms in her other hand, which rests lightly over the man’s forearm. A swath of white fabric, perhaps from her skirt, wraps up and over the man’s thigh, closer to her. Behind the woman, a tree grows on a low hill along the right edge of the canvas and off the top. The landscape opens into an expansive vista to our left with spindly trees growing in a low meadow that leads back to a body of water in the deep distance. Miniscule in scale, tiny boats and buildings line the water’s edge near the horizon. A few thin, silvery gray and petal-pink clouds skim across the pale blue sky.

Charles Willson Peale was a major figure in American science and art during the revolutionary period. His faith in the educational value of art led him to establish a painting academy in Philadelphia as early as 1795. When that venture failed, Peale combined his scientific and artistic interests in a museum.

In 1788, the Lamings had asked him to do this double portrait. Peale's diary records his activity from 18 September, when he "sketched out the design" after dinner, to 5 October, when he added the final touches. Besides working on the picture, Peale studied natural history at the family's estate outside Baltimore.

Peale cleverly devised a leaning posture for the husband so that his bulk would not overshadow his petite wife. Moreover, this unusual, reclining attitude binds the couple closer together, telling of their love.

The setting, "view of part of Baltimore Town," is appropriate for a wealthy Maryland merchant. The spyglass indicates Laming's interest in shippage by sea, and the green parrot perched behind his leg may recall his birth in the West Indies. Mrs. Laming's fruit and flowers, although traditional emblems of innocence and fertility, could also refer to her own gardening. The detailed attention paid to the bird, plants, scenery, and telescope attests to Peale's encyclopedic knowledge.

More information on this painting can be found in the Gallery publication American Paintings of the Eighteenth Century, pages 120-128, which is available as a free PDF at www.nga.gov/content/dam/ngaweb/research/publications/pdfs...

Of the three most talented painters born in the British colonies of North America, Charles Willson Peale, Benjamin West and John Singleton Copley, only Peale remained in America after the Revolution. Born in 1741 in Queen Anne's County, Maryland, and trained as a saddler, he became a painter in the 1760's by studying the work of other artists, including John Hesselius and Copley, whom he met in Boston in 1765. Several merchants and lawyers, including John Beale Bordley, financed a two year trip in 1767-1769 to London, where Peale studied with West. He steeped himself in English painting theory when he was in London, and corresponded with West for many years after his return to America.

Peale became a portrait painter in Maryland, Virginia and in Philadelphia, where he moved with his family in 1776. During and after the Revolution Peale combined his artistic career with Whig politics. He served with the Pennsylvania militia in battles against the British, carrying his miniature case to paint portraits of fellow officers. In 1779 the Supreme Executive Council of Pennsylvania commissioned him to paint the full-length of George Washington that commemorated the victories at Princeton and Trenton, the first official portrait of Washington (Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts). Peale's idea of a Gallery of Great Men led him to paint head and shoulder "museum" portraits; the first were completed by 1782. Peale was a friend of many intellectual and political leaders and eventually painted images of many of the heroes of the war and the new republic, including Washington, Thomas Jefferson, David Rittenhouse, the Marquis de Lafayette, and Benjamin Franklin (Independence National Historical Park, Philadelphia). He trained his brother James, his nephew Charles Peale Polk, and his sons Raphaelle, Rembrandt and Rubens Peale as painters, and was a founder of the Columbianum, the first American artists' society, which held its only public exhibition in Philadelphia in 1795.

By that time Peale had established a museum of natural history in Philadelphia. He continued to paint portraits, although he turned the business of miniature painting over to James Peale and increasingly concentrated on natural history and the museum. Its collections, which he moved to Independence Hall in 1802, were primarily scientific and included the mastodon bones that he recovered from their New York burial place in 1801. Although he was a founder of the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts in 1805, he painted fewer and fewer portraits, primarily of close friends and family. One of his last works was his full-length self-portrait, The Artist in his Museum (1822; The Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts).

Peale's diaries and letters reveal his lifelong energy and curiosity. His painting style was a combination of close observation, invention, and a personal interest in his sitters' lives. His role as a painter and teacher was equal to his interests in natural science and invention. His Whig political views placed him at the center of the formation of the new American republic, a role unlike that of his contemporaries Benjamin West and John Singleton Copley. Peale died in Philadelphia in 1827.

________________________________

The National Gallery of Art in Washington, DC is a world-class art museum that displays one of the largest collections of masterpieces in the world including paintings, drawings, prints, photographs, sculpture, and decorative arts from the 13th century to the present. The National Gallery of Art collection includes an extensive survey of works of American, British, Italian, Flemish, Spanish, Dutch, French and German art. With its prime location on the National Mall, surrounded by the Smithsonian Institution, visitors often think that the museum is a part of the Smithsonian. It is a separate entity and is supported by a combination of private and public funds. Admission is free. The museum offers a wide range of educational programs, lectures, guided tours, films, and concerts.

The original neoclassical building, the West Building includes European (13th-early 20th century) and American (18th-early 20th century) paintings, sculptures, decorative arts, and temporary exhibitions. The National Gallery of Art was opened to the public in 1941 with funds provided by the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation. The original collection of masterpieces was provided by Mellon, who was the U. S. Secretary of the Treasury and ambassador to Britain in the 1930s. Mellon collected European masterpieces and many of the Gallery’s original works were once owned by Catherine II of Russia and purchased in the early 1930s by Mellon from the Hermitage Museum in Leningrad.

The core collection includes major works of art donated by Paul Mellon, Ailsa Mellon Bruce, Lessing J. Rosenwald, Samuel Henry Kress, Rush Harrison Kress, Peter Arrell Browne Widener, Joseph E. Widener, and Chester Dale. The Gallery's collection of paintings, drawings, prints, photographs, sculpture, medals, and decorative arts traces the development of Western art from the Middle Ages to the present, including the only painting by Leonardo da Vinci in the Americas and the largest mobile created by Alexander Calder.

The NGA's collection galleries and Sculpture Garden display European and American paintings, sculpture, works on paper, photographs, and decorative arts. Paintings in the permanent collection date from the Middle Ages to the present. The Italian Renaissance collection includes two panels from Duccio's Maesta, the tondo of the Adoration of the Magi by Fra Angelico and Filippo Lippi, a Botticelli work on the same subject, Giorgione's Allendale Nativity, Giovanni Bellini's The Feast of the Gods, Ginevra de' Benci (the only painting by Leonardo da Vinci in the Americas) and groups of works by Titian and Raphael.

The collections include paintings by many European masters, including a version of Saint Martin and the Beggar, by El Greco, and works by Matthias Grünewald, Cranach the Elder, Rogier van der Weyden, Albrecht Dürer, Frans Hals, Rembrandt, Johannes Vermeer, Francisco Goya, Jean Auguste Dominique Ingres, and Eugène Delacroix, among others. The collection of sculpture and decorative arts includes such works as the Chalice of Abbot Suger of St-Denis and a collection of work by Auguste Rodin and Edgar Degas. Other highlights of the permanent collection include the second of the two original sets of Thomas Cole's series of paintings titled The Voyage of Life, (the first set is at the Munson-Williams-Proctor Arts Institute in Utica, New York) and the original version of Watson and the Shark by John Singleton Copley (two other versions are in the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston and the Detroit Institute of Arts).

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Gallery_of_Art

Andrew W. Mellon, who pledged both the resources to construct the National Gallery of Art as well as his high-quality art collection, is rightly known as the founder of the gallery. But his bequest numbered less than two hundred paintings and sculptures—not nearly enough to fill the gallery’s massive rooms. This, however, was a feature, not a failure of Mellon’s vision; he anticipated that the gallery eventually would be filled not only by his own collection, but also by additional donations from other private collectors. By design, then, it was both Andrew Mellon and those who followed his lead—among them, eight men and women known as the Founding Benefactors—to whom the gallery owes its premier reputation as a national art museum. At the gallery’s opening in 1941, President Roosevelt stated, “the dedication of this Gallery to a living past, and to a greater and more richly living future, is the measure of the earnestness of our intention that the freedom of the human spirit shall go on.”

www.doaks.org/resources/cultural-philanthropy/national-ga...

..

________________________________

The National Gallery of Art in Washington, DC is a world-class art museum that displays one of the largest collections of masterpieces in the world including paintings, drawings, prints, photographs, sculpture, and decorative arts from the 13th century to the present. The National Gallery of Art collection includes an extensive survey of works of American, British, Italian, Flemish, Spanish, Dutch, French and German art. With its prime location on the National Mall, surrounded by the Smithsonian Institution, visitors often think that the museum is a part of the Smithsonian. It is a separate entity and is supported by a combination of private and public funds. Admission is free. The museum offers a wide range of educational programs, lectures, guided tours, films, and concerts.

The original neoclassical building, the West Building includes European (13th-early 20th century) and American (18th-early 20th century) paintings, sculptures, decorative arts, and temporary exhibitions. The National Gallery of Art was opened to the public in 1941 with funds provided by the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation. The original collection of masterpieces was provided by Mellon, who was the U. S. Secretary of the Treasury and ambassador to Britain in the 1930s. Mellon collected European masterpieces and many of the Gallery’s original works were once owned by Catherine II of Russia and purchased in the early 1930s by Mellon from the Hermitage Museum in Leningrad.

The core collection includes major works of art donated by Paul Mellon, Ailsa Mellon Bruce, Lessing J. Rosenwald, Samuel Henry Kress, Rush Harrison Kress, Peter Arrell Browne Widener, Joseph E. Widener, and Chester Dale. The Gallery's collection of paintings, drawings, prints, photographs, sculpture, medals, and decorative arts traces the development of Western art from the Middle Ages to the present, including the only painting by Leonardo da Vinci in the Americas and the largest mobile created by Alexander Calder.

The NGA's collection galleries and Sculpture Garden display European and American paintings, sculpture, works on paper, photographs, and decorative arts. Paintings in the permanent collection date from the Middle Ages to the present. The Italian Renaissance collection includes two panels from Duccio's Maesta, the tondo of the Adoration of the Magi by Fra Angelico and Filippo Lippi, a Botticelli work on the same subject, Giorgione's Allendale Nativity, Giovanni Bellini's The Feast of the Gods, Ginevra de' Benci (the only painting by Leonardo da Vinci in the Americas) and groups of works by Titian and Raphael.

The collections include paintings by many European masters, including a version of Saint Martin and the Beggar, by El Greco, and works by Matthias Grünewald, Cranach the Elder, Rogier van der Weyden, Albrecht Dürer, Frans Hals, Rembrandt, Johannes Vermeer, Francisco Goya, Jean Auguste Dominique Ingres, and Eugène Delacroix, among others. The collection of sculpture and decorative arts includes such works as the Chalice of Abbot Suger of St-Denis and a collection of work by Auguste Rodin and Edgar Degas. Other highlights of the permanent collection include the second of the two original sets of Thomas Cole's series of paintings titled The Voyage of Life, (the first set is at the Munson-Williams-Proctor Arts Institute in Utica, New York) and the original version of Watson and the Shark by John Singleton Copley (two other versions are in the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston and the Detroit Institute of Arts).

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Gallery_of_Art

Andrew W. Mellon, who pledged both the resources to construct the National Gallery of Art as well as his high-quality art collection, is rightly known as the founder of the gallery. But his bequest numbered less than two hundred paintings and sculptures—not nearly enough to fill the gallery’s massive rooms. This, however, was a feature, not a failure of Mellon’s vision; he anticipated that the gallery eventually would be filled not only by his own collection, but also by additional donations from other private collectors. By design, then, it was both Andrew Mellon and those who followed his lead—among them, eight men and women known as the Founding Benefactors—to whom the gallery owes its premier reputation as a national art museum. At the gallery’s opening in 1941, President Roosevelt stated, “the dedication of this Gallery to a living past, and to a greater and more richly living future, is the measure of the earnestness of our intention that the freedom of the human spirit shall go on.”

www.doaks.org/resources/cultural-philanthropy/national-ga...

.

buff by Jo Gemmell