| Method | Stipple printed in colour |
| Artist | after Gilbert Stuart |
| Published | Painted by Stuart in America. Sold & Published August 1st, 1801, by Edwd. Orme, 59 New Bond Street, London. |
| Dimensions | Image 155 x 85 mm, Plate 175 x 120 mm, Sheet 295 x 220 mm |
| Notes |
An important and uncommon colour-printed stipple engraving of Thomas Jefferson, Founding Father of the United States of America, issued in the first year of his tenure as President. The engraving is based upon the first, and now lost, portrait of the President by the American painter Gilbert Stuart. Jefferson had sat for Stuart in Philadelphia in May 1800, but the artist was unhappy with the result, asking the President to sit again for him in 1805, the result of which was the famous 'Edgehill' Portrait, now in Monticello, Jefferson's plantation outside Charlottesville, Virginia. The portrait is a bust of Jefferson, turned slightly to his left but looking at the viewer, wearing a simple dark coat and a white necktie. Contemporaries often commented on the President's fashion, particularly that his sense of dress was usually old-fashioned, plain, or 'unstudied,' though some were less gentle in their appraisal, regarding him as shabby, wearing threadbare coats and soiled linens. Gilbert Stuart (1755-1828) was an American portrait painter, most famous for painting the unfinished Athenaeum portrait of George Washington, widely regarded as the definitive portrait of the First President of the United States of America and the basis for the design on the one dollar bill. Like the other Anglo-American painters of his generation, John Singleton Copley and Benjamin West, the Revolutionary War disrupted his ambitions, and he spent the period between 1775 and 1793 in London and Dublin. In addition to Washington, Stuart also painted numerous other Founding Fathers, heroes of the Revolutionary War, prominent American businessmen lawyers, and statesmen, and portraits of Louise XVI of France, and Kings George III and George IV of Great Britain. Despite being in high demand, with his services at one point commanding prices secondary only to Reynolds and Gainsborough, Stuart was frequently in debt as a product of financial and professional mismanagement, and had a habit of leaving portraits unfinished. His portrait of Jefferson, the so-called Edgehill Portrait, was only finally delivered in 1821, though Jefferson had sat for it in 1805, and spent fifteen years writing letters asking for updates on its progress. Condition: Minor time toning and creasing to sheet. |
| Framing | unmounted |
| Price | £375.00 |
| Stock ID | 52938 |