Conrad Alexandre Gérard, by Charles Willson Peale

Conrad Alexandre Gérard - FIRST MINISTER TO THE UNITED STATES FROM FRANCE, by Charles Willson Peale
Identifier: internationalstu62newy (find matches)
Title: International studio
Year: 1897 (1890s)
Authors:
Subjects: Art Decoration and ornament
Publisher: New York
Contributing Library: Robarts - University of Toronto
Digitizing Sponsor: University of Toronto



Text Appearing Before Image:
Aaron Burr from New York, that repub-lican oracle from Pennsylvania, Albert Gallatin,Oliver Ellsworth whom Connecticut is shortly topresent to the United States as Chief Justice,Richard Henry Lee of Virginia, and Andrew-Jackson, Tennessees idol and the future Presi-dent—all making the old chamber ring with ear-nest debate, while looking down upon them as ifstriving to catch their every word is the popularminister from France. Genius in guiding his brush, till the subject onhis canvas appeared a speaking, sentient beingmade Peale famous and sought after. His por-traits of Washington are said to have been four-teen in number. One, produced in 1772, and nowin the Lee Memorial Chapel of Washington andLee University, is the earliest known likeness ofthe Father of his Country. Another was origi-nally ordered by Congress, but, the artist experi-encing the same failure to extract his pay as inthe Gerard instance, it was bought, finally, for aprivate collection in Philadelphia. Still another
Text Appearing After Image:
CONRAD ALEXANDER GERARD FIRST MINISTER TO THE UNITED STATES FROM FRANCE BY CHARLES WILSON PEALE .7 Gem of Art in Gloucester, Mass. is in the National Institute at the Capital, hav-ing been presented to our Government by Countde Menon. a famous general of the French Revo-lution and under Napoleon. Besides Washington,manv others of the most noted men of his day satto this pupil of West and Copley; AlexanderHamilton and John Hancock, Bishop White andJefferson, stand as if types of their famous fellows.He lived to the ripe age of eighty-five, pursuinghis art to the last. A memorial to him, in a sense.at his home, the Quaker City, is the Pennsyl-vania Academy of the Fine Arts, for he was oneof its founder-. As to Gerard, his main claim upon the gratitudeand friendship of the new nation lay in his un-tiring efforts to cement close relations of amitybetween it and his own land. He it was, actingunder instructions from Yergennes, the Frenchforeign minister, who conducted negotiations withthe