James Peale

1822

Charles Willson Peale American, 1741-1827

On View

American, Level 2, West Wing

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Published References

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About the Artwork

Charles Willson Peale was the leading portrait painter in America for many years. He taught painting to several generations of his family and, in 1795, helped to establish a small art school in Philadelphia. The development of a science museum absorbed his middle years, but later in life he returned to painting. At age eighty-one he produced this affectionate portrait of his brother, James, showing the retired miniaturist gazing fondly at a portrait miniature of Rembrandt Peale’s oldest daughter, Rosalba, painted by Charles's daughter, Anna. The portrait miniature, “a picture within a picture,” is also in the DIA collection (acc. no. 53.345).

Title James Peale

Artwork Date 1822

Artist Charles Willson Peale

Life Dates 1741-1827

Nationality Please note: Definitions for nationality may vary significantly, depending on chronology and world events. Some definitions include: Belonging to a people having a common origin based on a geography and/or descent and/or tradition and/or culture and/or religion and/or language, or sharing membership in a legally defined nation. American

Culture Please note: Cultures may be defined by the language, customs, religious beliefs, social norms, and material traits of a group. Unknown

Medium Oil on canvas

Dimensions Framed: 35 1/8 × 43 7/8 × 4 inches (89.2 × 111.4 × 10.2 cm) Unframed: 24 1/2 × 36 inches (62.2 × 91.4 cm)

Classification Paintings

Department American Art before 1950

Credit Founders Society Purchase with funds from Dexter M. Ferry, Jr.

Accession Number This unique number is assigned to an individual artwork as part of the cataloguing process at the time of entry into the permanent collection. Most frequently, accession numbers begin with the year in which the artwork entered the museum’s holdings. For example, 2008.3 refers to the year of acquisition and notes that it was the 3rd of that year. The DIA has a few additional systems—no longer assigned—that identify specific donors or museum patronage groups. 50.58

Markings

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Provenance

Peale's Museum (Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, USA)

October 6, 1854, sold by (M.Thomas & Sons, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, USA), auction of holdings from Peale's Museum, lot 88, purchased for $55 by Anna Claypoole Peale. The name of the purchaser is recorded in an annotated copy of the auction catalogue at the Historical Society of Pennsylvania. Anna Claypoole Peale [1791-1878] (Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, USA). Augustin Runyon Peale, Jr. [1848-1910] (Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, USA)

Herbert Raphaelle Peale

Adele Peale Conway 1950, dealer, Edward A. Newman (Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, USA)

1950-present, purchase by the Detroit Institute of Arts (Detroit, Michigan, USA)

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Exhibition History

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Published References

Sellers, Charles Coleman. "Charles Willson Peale." The American Philosophical Society 2 (1947): p. 352.

Richardson, Edgar P. The Art Quarterly 13, 4 (1950): p. 348 (ill.).

________________. "A Portait of James Peale, the Miniature Painter (The Lamplight Portrait), by Charles Willson Peale." Bulletin of the DIA 30, 1 (1950-51): pp. 8-11.

Sellers, Charles Coleman. "Portraits and Miniatures by Charles Willson Peale." Transactions of the American Philosophical Society 42, 1 (1952): p. 166.

Paintings by the Peale Family. Exh. cat., The Cincinnati Art Museum. Cincinnati, 1954, no. 31.

Pennsylvania Painters. Exh. cat., The Mineral Industries Gallery. University Park, PA, 1955, no. 8.

Let Thee By Light. Exh. cat., The Wadsworth Atheneum. Hartford, 1965, no. 214.

Elam, Charles H., ed. The Peale Family: Three Generations of American Artists. Exh. cat., Detroit Institute of Arts. Detroit, 1967, no. 7.

____________________. Charles Willson Peale: A Biography. New York, 1969, p. 403.

Flexner, James Thomas. The Light of Distant Skies: American Painting, 1760-1835. New York, 1969, pp. 104-105. [reprint]

Cummings, Frederick J., and Charles H. Elam, eds. DIA Illustrated Handbook. Detroit, 1971, p. 134.

Sesquicentennial Exhibition, Part 1. Exh. cat., The Cummer Gallery. Jacksonville, FL, 1972, no. 10.

Wilmerding, John, ed. The Genius of American Painting. London, 1973, pp. 94, 95.

Rivard, Nancy. "American Paintings at the Detroit Institute of Arts." Antiques 114 (November 1978): p.

1044.

Charles Willson Peale and His World. Exh. cat., The National Portrait Gallery. Washington, D.C., 1983, pp. 99-100, 104, no. 74.

100 Masterworks from the Detroit Institute of Arts. New York, 1985, pp. 192-193 (ill.).

Miller, Lillian B. "In the Shadow of His Father: Rembrandt Peale, Charles Willson Peale, and the American Portrait Tradition." The Pennsylvania Magazine of History and Biography 110, 1 (January 1986): p. 44 (fig. 26).

Shaw, Nancy Rivard, et. al. American Paintings in the Detroit Institute of Arts, Vol. 1: Works by Artists Born Before 1816. New York, 1991, cat. 67, pp. 152-154. (col. ill.).

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Catalogue Raisoneé

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Credit Line for Reproduction

Charles Willson Peale, James Peale, 1822, oil on canvas. Detroit Institute of Arts, Founders Society Purchase with funds from Dexter M. Ferry, Jr., 50.58.