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Gilbert Stuart

Richard Yates, 1793/1794

West Building, Main Floor — Gallery 60-A

Medium

oil on canvas

Dimensions

overall: 75.5 x 61.9 cm (29 3/4 x 24 3/8 in.)

framed: 99.1 x 86.5 cm (39 x 34 1/16 in.)

Credit Line

Andrew W. Mellon Collection

Accession Number

1942.8.29

Artists / Makers

Gilbert Stuart (painter) American, 1755 - 1828

Image Use

This image is in the public domain.
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Overview

Information on this painting can be found in the Gallery publication American Paintings of the Eighteenth Century, pages 190-193, which is available as a free PDF https://www.nga.gov/content/dam/ngaweb/research/publications/pdfs/american-paintings-18th-century.pdf

Provenance

The sitter's daughter, Catherine Yates Pollock [c. 1760-1805] and her husband, George Pollock [1762-1820], New York and New Orleans; their son, Carlile Pollock [1791-1845], New Orleans; his daughter, Marie Louise Pollock Chiapella [1828-1902]; possibly to her son, Henry Chiapella [1849-c. 1908]; his niece, Louise Chiapella Formento, New Orleans; sold 1911 to Isaac Monroe Cline [1861-1955], New Orleans;[1] purchased 16 January 1918 by Thomas B. Clarke [1848-1931], New York;[2] his estate; sold as part of the Clarke collection on 29 January 1936, through (M. Knoedler & Co., New York), to The A.W. Mellon Education and Charitable Trust, Pittsburgh; gift 1940 to NGA.

[1] Cline wrote Thomas B. Clarke in New York on 11 February 1918 that he had purchased the portraits of Mrs. Yates, her husband Richard Yates [NGA 1942.8.29], and Lawrence Reid Yates [NGA 1940.1.5] in 1911, and had later bought portraits of Mr. and Mrs. Richard Yates' daughter Catherine Yates Pollock [NGA 1942.8.19] and her husband George Pollock [NGA 1942.8.18] (see NGA curatorial files). Cline told David E. Finley that he had purchased all five Stuart portraits from Formento; letter of 1 March 1948, in NGA curatorial files. For Cline's dates see Historic New Orleans Collection, Encyclopedia of New Orleans Artists 1718-1918, New Orleans, 1987, 81. For the Pollock family see Horace Edwin Hayden, Pollock Genealogy, Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, 1883, 48; letters from Bureau of Archives, St. Louis Cathedral, New Orleans, 3 April 1919 and 23 July 1918; "Last Will and Testament of George Pollock," signed 2 September 1819, New Orleans, and will of Carlile Pollock, signed 16 April 1845, New Orleans (copies, NGA curatorial files).

[2] The name of the seller and the date of purchase are recorded in a copy of Portraits by Early American Artists of the Seventeenth, Eighteenth and Nineteenth Centuries Collected by Thomas B. Clarke, Exh. cat., Philadelphia Museum of Art, 1928, annotated with information from files of M. Knoedler & Co., NY (copy in NGA curatorial records and in NGA library). Clarke sent Clarence J. Dearden of Art House, Inc., to New Orleans to negotiate the purchase of the five portraits; Dearden confirmed the purchase in a telegram to Clarke on 16 January 1918 (NGA curatorial files).

Associated Names

Chiapella, Henry
Chiapella, Marie Louise Pollock
Clarke, Thomas Benedict
Cline, Isaac Monroe
Formento, Louise Chiapella
Knoedler & Company, M.
Mellon Educational and Charitable Trust, The A.W.
Pollock, Carlile
Pollock, Catherine Yates
Pollock, George

Exhibition History

1922: Portraits Painted in the United States by Early American Artists, The Union League Club, February 1922, no. 21.

1928: A Loan Exhibition of Paintings by Early American Portrait Painters, The Century Association, New York, 1928, no. 2.

1928: Portraits by Early American Artists of the Seventeenth, Eighteenth and Nineteenth Centuries, Collected by Thomas B. Clarke, Philadelphia Museum of Art, 1928-1931, unnumbered and unpaginated catalogue.

1943: American Paintings, National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C., 1943.

1944: Gilbert Stuart: Portraits Lent by the National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C., Virginia Museum of Fine Arts, Richmond, 1944-1945, no. 7

1947: American Paintings from the Collection of the National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C., 1947.

1948: American Paintings from the Collection of the National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C., 1948.

1949: American Paintings from the Collection of the National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C., 1949.

1953: American Paintings from the Collection of the National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C., 1953.

1955: American Paintings from the Collection of the National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C., 1955.

1955: Famous Americans, Washington County Museum of Fine Arts, Hagerstown, Maryland, 1955, no cat.

1956: American Paintings from the Collection of the National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C., 1956.

1967: National Gallery Loan Exhibition, Mint Museum of Art, Charlotte, North Carolina, 1967, no. 1.

1970: Two Centuries of American Portraits, University of Kentucky Art Gallery, Lexington; Paducah Art Gallery; J.B. Speed Art Museum, Louisville, 1970, unnumbered

2004: Gilbert Stuart, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York; National Gallery of Art (for the National Portrait Gallery), Washington, D.C., 2004-2005, no. 27, repro.

Bibliography

1867: Tuckerman, Henry T. Book of the Artists. New York, 1867: 109.

1869: Dunlap, William. A History of the Rise and Progress of The Arts of Design in the United States. 2 vols. Reprinted in 3. New York, 1969 (1834): 1:196.

1922: Sherman, Frederic Fairchild. "Current Comment: Exhibitions." Art in America 10, no. 3 (April 1922): 144.

1926: Park 1926, 836, no. 942, repro.

1928: Barker, Virgil. "Portraiture in American before 1876." The Arts 13, no. 5 (May 1928): repro. 282.

1928: Portraits by Early American Artists of the Seventeenth, Eighteenth and Nineteenth Centuries, Collected by Thomas B. Clarke. Exh. cat. Philadelphia Museum of Art, 1928, unnumbered.

1949: Paintings and Sculpture from the Mellon Collection. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1949 (reprinted 1953 and 1958): 136, repro.

1964: Mount 1964, 377.

1970: American Paintings and Sculpture: An Illustrated Catalogue. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1970: 108, repro.

1980: American Paintings: An Illustrated Catalogue. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1980: 238, repro.

1980: Wilmerding, John. American Masterpieces from the National Gallery of Art. National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C., 1980: 52, repro.

1986: McLanathan 1986, 79, repro.

1988: Wilmerding 1988 am Masterpiece, 60, repro.

1992: American Paintings: An Illustrated Catalogue. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1992: 348, repro.

1995: Miles, Ellen G. American Paintings of the Eighteenth Century. The Collections of the National Gallery of Art Systematic Catalogue. Washington, D.C., 1995: 190-193, color repro. 191.