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Gilbert Stuart

Portrait of George Washington
Now On View

Maker

Gilbert Stuart (American, 1755-1828)

Title

Portrait of George Washington

Year

ca. 1805

Medium

Materials/Techniques

Techniques

Materials

oil paint

Supports

Geography

Place Made: America

Dimensions

66.7 x 53.3 cm (26 1/4 x 21 inches)

Credit / Object Number

Credit

Public Subscription Fund

Object Number

22.220

Type

Publications

Exhibition History

18th and 19th-Century American Galleries
Jun 19, 2015
Charles Pendleton House
Jan 02, 2015
Making It In America
Oct 11, 2013 – Feb 09, 2014

Label copy

Rhode Island native Gilbert Stuart painted several distinct portraits of George Washington from life. An unfinished head now known as the Athenaeum type, painted in Philadelphia in 1796, served as his prototype for numerous bust-length portraits of Washington that Stuart made in his Boston studio over the next 30 years. Stuart painted RISD’s variant for former Massachusetts senator Jonathan Mason. In it, he softened and rounded Washington’s face, simplified the black bow at the end of his queue, or braid, and loosely rendered his coat and shirt ruffle. In 1922, the Museum solicited public contributions to purchase the portrait from Mason’s descendants.

Romanticism and Revival
Nineteenth-Century American Art from the Permanent Collection
Dec 04, 1992 – Jun 26, 1993

Image use

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Public Domain This object is in the Public Domain and available under a CC0 1.0 Universal (CC0 1.0) Public Domain Dedication

Tombstone

Gilbert Stuart (American, 1755-1828)
Portrait of George Washington, ca. 1805
Oil on panel
66.7 x 53.3 cm (26 1/4 x 21 inches)
Public Subscription Fund 22.220

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