Images of the Colonial Family and Beyond

<body bgcolor="#ffffff"> <center><h2>Images of the Colonial Family and Beyond</h2></center><p> <hr size=2><br> <dl> <dt>Look at these various portraits of American families. Pay attention to both what you see when you look at the paintings and how the artist who painted it interpreted the family. Consider the ways that these portraits reflect patriarchial values, gender relations, attitudes towards children, the democratization of society, and other historical changes that we have talked about in class.<p> For one thing, pay attention to the placement of people in the portraits. Are they placed in heirarchies by height or by sides of the portrait? Are they segregated by age or sex? How does each sitter relate to the others in the portrait? Secondly, pay attention to the props that the sitters have with them. What would they signify about the person using them? Do they indicate something about their talents, skills, identities, and importance? Finally, notice the demeanor of the sitters. Are they serious, glum, or cheerful? What can you determine about the affective (emotional) relationships between spouses, siblings, and families in these portraits?</dl><p> <table cellpadding=5 width=100%> <tr align=center> <td width=15% align=center> <a href="graphics/iroyal.html"><img src="graphics/iroyalt.gif"></a> <td width=85% align=left> <b><a href="graphics/iroyal.html">Isaac Royall and His Family</a>, painted by Robert Feke, 1741.</b><br> A large and imposing group portrait of one of colonial Massachusetts' youngest and wealthiest men and his family.<p> <tr align=center> <td width=15% align=center> <a href="graphics/devpair.html"><img src="graphics/devpairt.gif"></a> <td width=85% align=left> <b><a href="graphics/devpair.html">The Reverend Ebenezer Devotion and Martha Devotion</a>, painted by Winthrop Chandler, 1770</b>.</br> Double portraits by a country artisan-artist of a rural Massachusetts minister and his wife.<p> <tr align=center> <td width=15% align=center> <a href="graphics/washfam.html"><img src="graphics/washfamt.gif"></a> <td width=85% align=left> <b><a href="graphics/washfam.html">The Washington Family</a>, painted by Edward Savage, 1804.</b><br> Portrait of the Revolutionary general and his family.<p> <tr align=center> <td width=15% align=center> <a href="graphics/moores.html"><img src="graphics/moorest.gif"></a> <td width=85% align=left> <b><a href="graphics/moores.html">Joseph Moore and His Family</a>, painted by Erastus Salisbury Field, 1839.</b><br> Portrait of a rural Massachusetts dentist/hatter/preacher and his family in their parlor.<p> <tr align=center> <td width=15% align=center> <a href="graphics/civmom.html"><img src="graphics/civmomt.gif"></a> <td width=85% align=left> <b><a href="graphics/civmom.html">Mother and Son</a>, Anonymous Daguerreotypist, n.d.</b><br> A new technology--the daguerreotype--for early photographic family portraits.<p> <tr align=center> <td width=15% align=center> <a href="graphics/currier.html"><img src="graphics/curriert.gif"></a> <td width=85% align=left> <b><a href="graphics/currier.html">The Four Seasons of Life--Middle Age: The Season of Strength</a>, Currier & Ives, 1868.</a></b><br> Famous lithograph of mid-nineteenth-century Romantic family life in a suburban village.<p> </table> <dl><dt>Additional sources for family portraits:<p> <dd><a href="http://www.nmaa.si.edu/secrets/secretshtml/secrets.html">Secrets of the Dark Chamber: The Art of the American Daguerreotype</a>--daguerreotypes at the National Museum of American Art, Smithsonian Institution, Washington, D.C.<p> <a href="http://www.mcny.org/currier.html">Currier and Ives, Printmakers to the American People.</a>--<a href="http://www.mcny.org/">Museum of the City of New York</a>.<p> </dl> <hr size=2><p> <font size=2><i>Prepared by Professor <a href="main.html">Catherine Lavender</a> for <a href="286f97.html">History 286</a> (American Women's History), <a href="../main.html">The Department of History</a>, The College of Staten Island of The City University of New York. Send email to <a href="mailto:lavender@postbox.csi.cuny.edu">lavender@postbox.csi.cuny.edu</a><br> Fall Semester 1997. Last modified: Sunday 28 September 1997</i>