Rembrandt Peale: George Washington George Washington, 1827
Lithograph on chine collé The Charles E. Goodspeed collection In
1795, when President Washington sat for Charles Willson Peale
(q.v.), the artist's young son Rembrandt was allowed to paint
his own portrait of the statesman. Thirty years later Rembrandt
Peale returned to the subject, producing a series of idealized
paintings and prints calculated to appeal to a nationalist cult
fascinated by the heroic myth surrounding Washington. This
lithograph, the most famous of the images, combined the
painter's own recollections with elements from famed portraits
by his father and by Gilbert Stuart. One of the first American
artists to use lithography, Peale drew his original portrait
directly on the printing surface. The image was then printed by
William S. and John B. Pendleton, Peale's former students, who
ran one of America's most important early lithographic workshops
in Boston. Such prints disseminated Peale's art to a broad
audience, helping to publicize h