- Gallery Text
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Stuart created more than a hundred portraits of George Washington. Scholars group them into three types, named for their original owners: the unfinished “[Boston] Athenaeum” portraits, showing the left side of Washington’s face (such as the image on the U.S. dollar); the Samuel “Vaughan” portraits, which show the right side of Washington’s face; and the full-length “Lansdowne” portraits. In this example of the Vaughan type, the second-term president looks majestic and vigorous in his advanced years. He is positioned in three-quarter profile against a sweeping curtain that symbolizes state authority. His hair, styled in what’s called a soldier’s queue and tied with a sawtooth bow, appears freshly cut and powdered. The upturned collar of his velvet suitcoat projects height and wealth. The portrait represents Washington as an august actor on the world stage and suggests how gender, race, and visual scale can engage and inform ideologies of power.
- Identification and Creation
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- Object Number
- H631
- People
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Gilbert Stuart, American (North Kingstown, RI 1755 - 1828 Boston, MA)
George Washington (1732 - 1799)
- Title
- George Washington (1732-1799)
- Other Titles
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Former Title: George Washington-- "Vaughan" type
Former Title: The Fisher Family Portrait
Former Title: The Fisher-Tyler Portrait - Classification
- Paintings
- Work Type
- painting
- Date
- c. 1795
- Places
- Creation Place: North America, United States
- Culture
- American
- Persistent Link
- https://hvrd.art/o/302052
- Physical Descriptions
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- Medium
- Oil on canvas
- Dimensions
- 73.7 x 61 cm (29 x 24 in.)
framed: 92.7 x 79.4 x 7.6 cm (36 1/2 x 31 1/4 x 3 in.)
- Provenance
- Fisher Family, Philadelphia, 1796, sold; to Mrs. George F. Tyler, Philadelphia, 1921, by descent; to Sydney F. Tyler, Carbondale, CO, gift; to Harvard University, 1969.
- Acquisition and Rights
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- Credit Line
- Harvard University Portrait Collection, Gift of Sidney F. Tyler to the University, 1969
- Object Number
- H631
- Division
- European and American Art
- Contact
- am_europeanamerican@harvard.edu
- The Harvard Art Museums encourage the use of images found on this website for personal, noncommercial use, including educational and scholarly purposes. To request a higher resolution file of this image, please submit an online request.
- Descriptions
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- Description
- Vaughan Type
- Publication History
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Mantle Fielding, Gilbert Stuart's Portraits of Washington (1923), no. 6, ill. opp. p. 39
Lawrence Park, Gilbert Stuart: An lllustrated Descriptive List of His Works, vol. I - IV, W. E. Rudge (New York, NY, 1926), vol. II, pp. 848-49, no. 6
John Hill Morgan and Mantle Fielding, The Life Portraits of Washington and their Replicas, Lancaster Press, Inc. (Lancaster, PA, 1931), p. 253, no. 6, ill. opp. p. 256
Charles Merrill Mount, Gilbert Stuart: A Biography, W. W. Norton & Company (New York, NY, 1964), p. 378
The Frick Collection: An Illustrated Catalogue. Volume I: Paintings: American, British, Dutch, Flemish, and German, The Frick Collection (New York, 1968), p. 4
Kenyon Castle Bolton, III, Peter G. Huenink, Earl A. Powell III, Harry Z. Rand, and Nanette C. Sexton, American Art at Harvard, exh. cat., Fogg Art Museum (Cambridge, MA, 1972), cat. 23, ill.
Dorinda Evans, Philadelphia: Three Centuries of American Art, Bicentennial Exhibition, exh. cat., Philadelphia Museum of Art (Philadelphia, 1976), pp. 170-171
Timothy Anglin Burgard, American Art at Harvard: Cultures and Contexts, brochure, Harvard University Art Museums (Cambridge, MA, 1994), pp. 2, 10, cat. 2
Carrie Rebora Barratt and Ellen G. Miles, Gilbert Stuart, exh. cat., Metropolitan Museum of Art / Yale University Press (New York, 2004), pp. 141-142, ill. p. 142, fig. 86
Theodore E. Stebbins, Jr. and Melissa Renn, American Paintings at Harvard, Volume One: Paintings, Watercolors, and Pastels by Artists Born before 1826, Yale University Press (U.S.) and Harvard Art Museums (Cambridge and New Haven, 2014), pp. 33, 398, 448-50, cat. 415, ill.
- Exhibition History
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American Art at Harvard, Fogg Art Museum, Cambridge, 04/19/1972 - 06/18/1972
Philadelphia: Three Centuries of American Art, Bicentennial Exhibition, Philadelphia Museum of Art, Philadelphia, 04/09/1976 - 10/10/1976
American Art at Harvard: Cultures and Contexts, Harvard University Art Museums, Cambridge, 10/01/1994 - 12/30/1994
32Q: 2200 19th Century, Harvard Art Museums, Cambridge, 11/16/2014 - 11/14/2022
- Related Works
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This record has been reviewed by the curatorial staff but may be incomplete. Our records are frequently revised and enhanced. For more information please contact the Division of European and American Art at am_europeanamerican@harvard.edu