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John Gray

John Singleton Copley American, 1738-1815
On View

in

American, Level 2, West Wing

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About the Artwork

John Gray

1766

John Singleton Copley

1738-1815

American

Unknown

Oil on canvas

Unframed: 49 3/8 × 39 1/4 inches (125.4 × 99.7 cm) Framed: 56 3/8 × 46 3/8 × 3 1/4 inches (143.2 × 117.8 × 8.3 cm)

Paintings

American Art before 1950

Founders Society Purchase, Gibbs-Williams Fund

43.30

Public Domain

Markings

Signed and dated, lower right, on column base: J. S. Copley, pinxt 1766

Inscribed, lower right, on column base: J. S. Copley pinxt 1766

Provenance

1766-1782, John Gray.
1873, Judge John Gray Otis (Boston, Massachusetts, USA).
1899, Judge John Gray Rodgers (Boston, Massachusetts, USA).
by 1908, the Misses Rogers.
1928-1943, Mrs. W. Arthur Dupee;
1943, dealer, M. Knoedler Co. (New York, New York, USA);
1943-present, purchase by the Detroit Institute of Arts (Detroit, Michigan, USA)

For more information on provenance, please visit:

Provenance page

Exhibition History

Please note: This section is empty

The exhibition history of a number of objects in our collection only begins after their acquisition by the museum, and may reflect an incomplete record.

We welcome your feedback for correction and/or improvement.

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Published References

Bayley, Frank W. Sketch of the Life and a List of Some of the Works of John Singleton Copley. Boston, 1910, p. 123.

______________. The Life and Works of John Singleton Copley. Boston, 1915, p. 213 (ill.).

Early American Portraits. Exh. cat., M. Knoedler Company. New York, 1921, no. 1.

Bayley, Frank W. Five Colonial Artists of New England. Boston, 1929 (pl. 213).

Bolton, Theodore and Harry Lorin Binsse. “John Singleton Copley.” Antiquarian 15 (December 1930): p. 116.

Jones, E.A. Loyalists of Massachusetts: Their Memorials, Petitions, and Claims. London, 1930, p. 152 (ill.).

The Paintings of John Singleton Copley. Exh. cat., Metropolitan Museum of Art. New York, 1936, no. 17 (ill.).

Parker, B. and Anne Wheeler. John Singleton Copley. Boston, 1938, pp. 88-89 (pl. 76).

Richardson, Edgar P. Paintings in America: The Story of 450 Years. Exh. cat., Detroit Institute of Arts. Detroit, 1957, p. 72.

Prown, Jules D. John S. Copley 1774-1815. Cambridge, MA, 1966, pp. 38-39, 53, 216 (fig. 171).

Exhibition of Pictures from Museums of the United States of America. Exh. cat., The Hermitage. Leningrad, 1976, p. 11.

Shaw, Nancy Rivard, et al. American Paintings in the Detroit Institute of Arts, Volume I. New York, 1991, pp. 56, 58-59 (ill.).

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Catalogue Raisoneé

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Credit Line for Reproduction

John Singleton Copley, John Gray, 1766, oil on canvas. Detroit Institute of Arts, Founders Society Purchase, Gibbs-Williams Fund, 43.30.

John Gray
John Gray