Eileen M. DeMaio
The Limners
—early 1700’s
The earliest known American artists used to paint portraits. These men were not called artists at this time, they were called Limners. They were self taught craftsmen skilled in painting decorations on houses, signs, furniture and limning. The word limning is derived from a medieval term for drawing or making pictures with lines. The demand for his craft was not so great that he could work from a studio. He spent most of his time traveling from one settlement to the next. He acquired his customers by word of mouth, by advertising in the local newspaper (if there was one by then) or by going door to door like a peddler. If business was good, he would stay in town—when it slacked off, he would pack up his things and move on.
The Limner, being self taught, knew little or nothing of the fundamentals of art. He lacked skill in mixing colors, perspective, anatomical drawing and shading techniques. He also lacked a personal style. He simply painted what he saw as best he could. As a result, he used color arbitrarily and his paintings usually looked very flat and lifeless. He payed no special attention to an individual’s own subtle characteristics so very often one person would end up looking like the next. Despite the Limner’s inadequacies as an artist, their paintings have a special simplicity and sincerity. We can view them as a look into our country’s past. We can see the way people used to dress and also the things that they cared about. Very often the Limner would paint in some of the person’s personal possessions or would include some clues as to their occupation or hobbies.
Limners seldom signed their names to their work. On occasion they would inscribe the name of their subject and the date. Most of these portraits remained anonymous.
John Singleton Copley—1737 (?)1815
John Singleton Copley was born in Boston, Massachusetts in 1737. He was trained as an engraver, but at an early age he knew he would like to be an artist. He studied and copied the works of other artists from his area. At the age of eighteen, he was a popular young artist who could turn out a portrait as well as anyone in the colonies. At twenty, he could paint a better portrait than any other artist in America. But this was not enough for him, he still wanted to improve his artwork. He was known as a thorough and meticulous craftsman. Copley paid close attention to nature and real life. You will notice in his paintings he shows a great skill in depicting textiles, hair, facial features and other surface textures. He was concerned with not only capturing an exact likeness of a person’s looks, but also their character as well. Many of his portraits were of Boston aristocrats or upper class merchants like Paul Revere. Copley did not paint Mr. Revere in his best clothes instead he chose to depict him as the artist and craftsmen he was. He is shown with shirtsleeves showing and his silversmithing tools out about him. Copley has captured Mr. Revere at work in a moment of sincere reflection.
As a result of Copley’s desire to ever improve his skill he moved to England, where he could study with other artists and learn from their paintings. Although he continued his career in England, he is best known as an American painter. His best paintings by far were done in America, once in England he became interested in history painting.
George Catlin—(17961872)
Catlin was born in Pennsylvania in 1796. His parents sent him to law school but Catlin taught himself to paint. He practiced on friends and relatives without much success. One day in 1824 a delegation of Far West Indians came to town dressed in all their various costumes and performing some of their dances and ceremonial rites. Young Catlin was deeply impressed. He made some sketches and realized they were some of the best he had done so far. He had an idea to found an Indian gallery that would contain his paintings of all the Indian tribes that still existed in America at this time. He felt he must record every detail of the Indians in their “natural state”, before they disappeared. Catlin felt the Indian was doomed, and that “the history and customs of such a people, preserved by pictorial illustrations, are themes worthy of the life time of one man, and nothing short of loss of my life shall prevent me from visiting their country, and of becoming their historian.”
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Catlin was determined and in 1830 he set out on his journey to visit all known North American tribes and bring home portraits of their leaders, views of their villages, pictures of them at play and daily work, along with notes on their character and history. Catlin was very successful in his mission. The Indians greeted him with friendship and most of the time he would stay right in their villages. He worked very hard and accomplished an amazing amount of work in a limited amount of time. He organized his exhibit in 1837 and traveled with it to tell the world of these people and the threat of the American government on their way of life.
Although his cause seemed to be a lost one at the time, Catlin will best be remembered for his depiction of the Indians. His beautiful portraits are full of life and beauty. We can see that he truly knew these people he painted and believed in their way of life. His entire collection of artifacts and paintings are now housed in the Smithsonian Institute in Washington.