This bold new history recovers an unknown American Revolution as seen through the eyes of Boston-born painter John Singleton Copley.
Boston in the 1740s: a bustling port at the edge of the British empire. A boy comes of age in a small wooden house along the Long Wharf, which juts into the harbor, as though reaching for London thousands of miles across the ocean. Sometime in his childhood, he learns to draw.
That boy was John Singleton Copley, who became, by the 1760s, colonial America’s premier painter. His brush captured the faces of his neighbors―ordinary men like Paul Revere, John Hancock, and Samuel Adams―who would become the revolutionary heroes of a new United States. Today, in museums across America, Copley’s brilliant portraits evoke patriotic fervor and rebellious optimism.
The artist, however, did not share his subjects’ politics. Copley’s nation was Britain; his capital, London. When rebellion sundered Britain’s empire, both kin and calling determined the painter’s allegiances. He sought the largest canvas for his talents and the safest home for his family. So, by the time the United States declared its independence, Copley and his kin were in London. He painted America’s revolution from a far shore, as Britain’s American War.
An intimate portrait of the artist and his extraordinary times, Jane Kamensky’s A Revolution in Color masterfully reveals the world of the American Revolution, a place in time riven by divided loyalties and tangled sympathies. Much like the world in which he lived, Copley’s life and career were marked by spectacular rises and devastating falls. But though his ambivalence cost him dearly, the painter’s achievements in both Britain and America made him a towering figure of both nations’ artistic legacies.
8 pages of color; 50 illustrations"synopsis" may belong to another edition of this title.
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Book Description Hardcover. Condition: new. Hardcover. In this intimate portrait of the painter John Singleton Copley and his extraordinary times, award-winning Harvard historian Jane Kamensky gives "a wonderfully fresh and surprising perspective on the American Revolution" (Stephen Greenblatt), a world riven by divided loyalties and tangled sympathies. Though Copley's prodigious talent earned him the patronage of Boston's patriot leaders, including Samuel Adams and Paul Revere, he did not share their politics and lamented America's provincialism. When painting portraits failed to satisfy his lofty ambitions and colonial resistance escalated, Copley looked longingly across the Atlantic, repatriating to London where he gained renown as the painter of Britain's American War. With a "vibrant prose style, Kamensky probes deeply" (New York Times), bringing new insight to this tumultuous period as seen through a towering figure of both Britain's and Americas artistic legacies.8 pages of color; 50 illustrations This bold new history recovers the American Revolution, as seen through the eyes of Boston-born painter John Singleton Copley. Shipping may be from multiple locations in the US or from the UK, depending on stock availability. Seller Inventory # 9780393240016