Benjamin West, 1738–1820, American, active in Britain (from 1763)
Title:
The Artist and His Family
Date:
ca. 1772
Materials & Techniques:
Oil on canvas
Dimensions:
20 1/2 x 26 1/4 inches (52.1 x 66.7 cm)
Inscription(s)/Marks/Lettering:
Signed and dated, lower left: "B. West, 1770/72[?]" [mostly illegible]
Credit Line:
Yale Center for British Art, Paul Mellon Collection
Copyright Status:
Public Domain
Accession Number:
B1981.25.674
Classification:
Paintings
Collection:
Paintings and Sculpture
Subject Terms:
ruffle | mother | group portrait | artist | brown coat | conversation piece | brother | curtains | headpiece | breeches | family | self-portrait | painter | Quakers | collar | palette | children | portrait | hat | father | son | baby | men | buckles | boy | infant | woman | armchairs
Currently On View:
Not on view
Exhibition History:
An American's Passion for British Art - Paul Mellon's Legacy (Yale Center for British Art, 2007-04-18 - 2007-07-29)An American's Passion for British Art - Paul Mellon's Legacy (Royal Academy of Arts, 2007-10-20 - 2008-01-27)This Other Eden : British Paintings from the Paul Mellon Collection at Yale (Art Gallery of New South Wales, 1998-05-01 - 1998-07-05)This Other Eden : British Paintings from the Paul Mellon Collection at Yale (Queensland Art Gallery, 1998-07-15 - 1998-09-06)This Other Eden : British Paintings from the Paul Mellon Collection at Yale (Art Gallery of South Australia, 1998-09-16 - 1998-11-15)Benjamin West (1738-1820) (The Baltimore Museum of Art, 1989-05-28 - 1989-08-20)The Conversation Piece - Arthur Devis & His Contemporaries (Yale Center for British Art, 1980-10-01 - 1980-11-30)American Art and Artifacts - The Interpretation of Objects (Yale University Art Gallery, 1979-09-11 - 1980-01-06)Painting in England 1700-1850 - From The Collection of Mr. and Mrs. Paul Mellon (Yale University Art Gallery, 1965-04-15 - 1965-06-20)
Publications:
Robert C. Alberts, Benjamin West : A Biography, Houghton Mifflin Company, Boston, 1978, p. 397, p. 20 in unnumered plate section between pp. 78 and 79, NJ18 W52 A6 (YCBA)John Baskett, Paul Mellon's Legacy: a Passion for British Art: Masterpieces from the Yale Center for British Art, , Yale Center for British Art, New Haven, CT, 2007, p. 261, no. 43, pl. 43, N5220 M552 P38 2007 OVERSIZE (YCBA)Rose Clare, Children's clothes since 1750, B.T. Batsford, London, 1989, p. 24, fig. 12, GT1730 R67 1989 (YCBA)Tom Coates, Creating a self-portrait, Mitchell Beazley, London, 1989, p. 118, N7618 C62 1989 (YCBA)Malcolm Cormack, Concise Catalogue of Paintings in the Yale Center for British Art, Yale Center for British Art, New Haven, CT, 1985, pp. 240-241, N590.2 A83 (YCBA)Ellen G. D'Oench, The Conversation Piece: Arthur Devis & his contemporaries, , Yale Center for British Art, New Haven, 1980, pp. 4, 74, cat. no. 60, fig. 20, NJ18 D5151 D64 OVERSIZEJohn Dillenberger, Benjamin West : The Context of his Life's Work, with Particular Attention to Paintings with Religious Subject Matter, Including a Correlated Version of Early Nineteenth-Century Lists of West's Paintings, Exhibitions, and Sales Records of his Works..., , Trinity University Press, San Antonio, 1977, pp. 5-6, NJ18 W52 +D55 Oversize (YCBA)Exhibition Catalogue. 1777. 9th, Exhibition of the Royal Academy of Arts, no. 9, Royal Academy of Arts, London, 1777, p. 27, no. 367, N5054 A53 v. 1:1 (YCBA)Dr. Kenneth Garlick, The Bicentennial Exhibition at the Royal Academy, Apollo, v. 89, no. 84, February 1969, p. 92, fig. 5, A1 A54 + (YCBA)Catherine M. Gordon, British paintings Hogarth to Turner, Frederick Warne, London, 1981, p. 70, ND466 G67 (YCBA)Loyd Grossman, Benjamin West and the struggle to be modern, Merrell, London: New York, 2015, pp. 42, 42-47, 52-53, fig. 21, NJ18.W52 G76 2015 (YCBA)Lea Kuhn, "Painting Historicity : William Dunlap's Engagement with the Circumstances of Time and Place", Art History, 45, February 2022, p. 108, fig. 4, N1 A75 45:1 2022 (YCBA) Also available online at YaleCharles Robert Leslie, Hand-book for young painters, London, 1870, pp. 294-5, ND1135 L47 1870 (YCBA)Margaretta M. Lovell, Art in a season of revolution, painters, artisans, and patrons in early America , University of Pennsylvania Press, Philadelphia, Pa., 2005, pp. 141..., pl. VII, N6515 L68 2005 (YCBA)Julia Marciari-Alexander, This other Eden : Paintings from the Yale Center for British Art, , Yale Center for British Art, New Haven, CT, 1998, pp. 10, 11, 60-1, no. 18, fig. 10, ND1314.3 Y36 1998 (YCBA)R. Melville, Two centuries of summer shows: Exhibition at the Burlington House, Architectural Review, vol. 145, March 1969, p. 195, NA1 A737 OVERSIZE (HAAS)Lillian B. Miller, The Peale family, creation of a legacy 1770-1870 , Abbeville Press, New York, 1996, p. 45, fig. 16, NJ18 P3 P43 FKZ 0875 1996 OVERSIZE (HAAS)Charles Franklin Montgomery, American art, 1750-1800, towards independence , Yale University Art Gallery, Boston, MA, 1976, N6507 A54 1976 + (Bass)National Gallery of Art, Painting in Georgian England from the collection of Mr. and Mrs. Paul Mellon., National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C., 1970, p. 16, no. 44, ND488 P25 (YCBA)Alexander Nemerow, The Ashes of Germanicus and the Skin of Painting, Sublimation and Money in Benjamin West's Agrippina , The Yale Journal of Criticism, vol. 11, no. 1, Spring, 1998, p. 13, fig. 2, PN80 Y35 (SML) Also available Online (Orbis)Painting in England 1700-1850 : collection of Mr. & Mrs. Paul Mellon : Exhibition at the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts, , 1,2, Virginia Museum of Fine Arts, Richmond, VA, 1963, pp. 135 (v. 1), no. 256, ND466 V57 v.1-2 (YCBA)Painting in England 1700-1850 from the Collection of Mr. and Mrs. Paul Mellon, The Royal Academy of Arts Winter Exhibition 1964-65., , Royal Academy of Arts, London, UK, 1964, p. 40 (v.1), no. 146, pl. 67, ND466 R68 1964/65 (YCBA)Paul Mellon's Legacy : a passion for British art [large print labels], , Yale Center for British Art, New Haven, CT, 2007, v. 3, N5220 M552 P381 2007 OVERSIZE (YCBA)Jules D. Prown, Art as Evidence : Writings on Art and Material Culture, , Yale University Press, New Haven, CT, 2001, pp. 7, 117-32, pl. 4, fig. 7.1, N6507 P745 2001 (YCBA)Susan Rather, The American school : artists and status in the late-colonial and early national era, Yale University Press, New Haven, 2016, pp. 120-21, fig. 100, N6507 .R38 2016 (YCBA)Kate Retford, The art of domestic life, family portraiture in eighteenth-century England , Yale University Press, New Haven, London, 2006, pp. 121, 123, 124-26, fig. 89, ND1313.4 .R48 2006 (YCBA)Royal Academy of Arts Bicentenary exhibition, 1768-1968, catalogue [of an exhibition held on] 14 December 1968-2 March 1969. , Royal Academy of Arts, London, 1968, p. 36, N6764 R69 (YCBA) Illustration volume; YCBA does not hold text voukme in hard copy. For Text, see Fiche B223 (YCBA)Royal Academy of Arts bicentenary exhibition, 1768-1968, catalogue [of an exhibition held on] 14 December 1968-2 March 1969. , Royal Academy of Arts, London, 1968, Fiche # 1, p. 45 ; Fiche # 4, p. 36, no. 50, Illus: p. 36, Fiche B223 (YCBA) YCBA also holds the illustration volume in hard copy: See N6764 .R69 (YCBA)David Sox, Quakers and the arts, plain and fancy, an Anglo-American perspective , Sessions Book Trust Friends United Press, York, England Richmond, Ind., 2000, NX180 R4 S67X 2000 (SML)James Christen Steward, The New Child : British Art and the Origins of Modern Childhood, 1730-1830, , University Art Museum and Pacific Film Archive, UC Berkeley, Berkeley, 1995, p. 105, fig. 19, N6766 S78 1995 OVERSIZE (YCBA)Ann C. Van Devanter, American self-portraits, 1670-1973, International Exhibitions Foundation, Washington, DC, 1974, pp. 24-5, ND1311 V36 + (LSF)Helmut von Erffa, The Paintings of Benjamin West, Yale University Press, New Haven, 1986, pp. 32, 403, 428, 431, 450, 461-62, 479, no. 546, NJ18 W52 A12 +E73 Oversize (YCBA)R. J. B. Walker, Regency portraits, National Portrait Gallery, London, 1985, p. 545 (vol. 1), N1090 A592 (YCBA)John Wilmerding, Essays in honor of Paul Mellon, collector and benefactor, Essays , National Gallery of Art, Washington, DC & Hanover, NH, 1986, p. 269-86, N7442.2 M455 1986 (YCBA)Yale University Art Gallery, Painting in England, 1700-1850, from the collection of Mr. and Mrs. Paul Mellon : [exhibition at] Yale University Art Gallery, April 15-June 20, 1965, , vol. 1, W. Clowes and sons, New Haven, 1965, pp. 57-8 (v.1), no. 216, pl. 67, ND466 Y35 (YCBA)
Gallery Label:
In 1760, Benjamin West left Springfield in the Pennsylvania Colony for Italy, determined to improve his artistic education through exposure to the art of antiquity and the Italian Renaissance. Three years later he settled in London, where he quickly established himself as the leading history painter and a favorite of King George III. Despite its modest size, this painting is a profound meditation on West’s own cosmopolitan identity. Standing to the right, West is dressed in a luxurious lilac mantle, palette in hand. Betsy, his American-born wife, sits in the window with their two sons; the newborn was a godson to Benjamin Franklin. The artist’s Quaker father, John, sits in profile next to the artist’s half brother, Thomas. They sit together quietly, soberly dressed Quakers, while Benjamin West stands behind, the famous head of an affluent and fashionable family having progressed from colonial innkeeper’s son to confidant of the king. Gallery label for installation of YCBA collection, 2022