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Mrs. George Watson
1765
John Singleton Copley
Born: Boston, Massachusetts 1738
Died: London, England 1815
oil on canvas
49 7/8 x 40 in. (126.7 x 101.6 cm)
Smithsonian American Art Museum
Partial gift of Henderson Inches, Jr., in honor of his parents, Mr. and Mrs. Inches, and museum purchase made possible in part by Mr. and Mrs. R. Crosby Kemper through the Crosby Kemper Foundation; the American Art Forum; and the Luisita L. and Franz H. Denghausen Endowment
1991.189
Smithsonian American Art Museum
2nd Floor,
South Wing
Mrs. Watson, the wife of a wealthy Boston merchant, wears a fashionably low-cut gown of luscious satin and white lace and holds a porcelain vase that echoes the contours of her figure. The yards of expensive fabric and silk ribbons in the costume testified to George Watson's success as an importer of European goods, as did the fact that he could afford to commission a portrait from Boston's foremost painter. Mrs. Watson showed herself to colonial society as a fashionable English matron, but her direct gaze suggests the grit and character of a new American society that would emerge within ten years.
Exhibition Label, Smithsonian American Art Museum, 2006
Keywords
Dress - historic - eighteenth century dress
Figure(s) in interior
Object - flower - tulip
Object - other - vase
Portrait female - Watson, Elizabeth Oliver - knee length
Portrait female - Watson, George, Mrs. - knee length
painting
paint - oil
fabric - canvas
About John Singleton Copley
Born: Boston, Massachusetts 1738 Died: London, England 1815
More works in the collection by
John Singleton Copley
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