  About the Artwork
  
  
  From 1752 to 1763, English-born artist Joseph Blackburn painted more than one hundred portraits of wealthy colonists in a modern British style that emphasized fashionable dress and personal refinement. After leaving Great Britain, he painted first in Bermuda in 1752 before traveling to Newport, Rhode Island; Boston, Massachusetts; and Portsmouth, New Hampshire. He returned home to Great Britain after that prolific period.

James Pitts (1712 – 1776) was a prominent merchant and politician in Boston. He is best remembered today for advocating against the concentration of power in the office of a royally appointed governor and against the housing of British troops in Boston. He penned a November 1773 resolution protesting the importation of tea to Boston by the East India Company, warning of “[c]onsequences that may disturb the Peace and good Order of the Town.” The Boston Tea Party followed in December.
  
  
  Title
  James Pitts
  
  
  Artwork Date
  1757
  
  Artist
  Joseph Jonathan Blackburn
  
  
  
  Life Dates
  1700-1780
  
  
  
  
  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.
  
  
  
  
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  Medium
  Oil on canvas
  
  
  Dimensions
  Unframed: 50 1/8 × 40 inches (127.3 × 101.6 cm)
  Framed: 57 3/4 × 47 5/8 × 3 inches (146.7 × 121 × 7.6 cm)
  
  
  Classification
  Paintings
  
  
  Department
  American Art before 1950
  
  
  Credit
  Founders Society Purchase, Gibbs-Williams Fund
  
  
  
  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.
  
  
  
  58.357
  
  
  Copyright
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