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- [00:00]
A
Foreign welcome to the Hillsdale College Online Courses podcast. I am Jeremiah Regan and I am pleased to be joined by my friend, professor emeritus of art and the instructor for your course, American Paintings, Sam Knecht.
- [00:21]
B
Hi, Jeremiah. And hi folks. I'm delighted to be here today and tell you how great this course is. I had a wonderful time preparing for it and delivering it and hope that you'll join us in taking the course.
- [00:36]
A
Now, the course is American Paintings, and Sam is the perfect person to teach the course because he taught art, including art history, at the College for over 40 years. But he is, in his own right, a very accomplished painter. So the old joke that those who can't do teach does not apply to Sam. Today in American Paintings, we're Talking about Lecture 1, American Heroes, and I want to share something very striking that Sam said that really got my mind working and pulled at my heartstrings. He said, and I'm paraphrasing, loving painting helps you love mankind all the more. And in the case of American Paintings, it causes me to love Americans all the more. And I thought, what a great message to introduce a course in appreciating not only art, but the art of our country and using that as an avenue by which to better love our fellow citizens.
- [01:31]
B
Yeah, thank you, Jeremiah. The course really is a gateway to the splendor and the breadth of American painting. And Jeremiah said, I totally believe that it makes you become a better citizen, a better person to study American paintings, to see how Americans have behaved and what they've believed in and expressed over the centuries.
- [01:57]
A
It's a real pleasure to have you, the professor, on the course, joining us on the podcast. So let's give our listeners a little bit of an overview of the course. We have four lectures and each one has a theme. The first is American Heroes, then landscapes and cityscapes, everyday Americans. And the final lecture is on battle scenes. Can you tell us a little bit about how you determined those to be the subjects of the lectures?
- [02:22]
B
Since I taught at Hillsdale College forever, it seemed obvious that I should do something to cover the presidents. And so Lecture one, American Heroes, concentrates on a few of our most notable presidents. But actually I led off with Paul Revere, a non president, but a great way to kind of jump start how Americans have seen themselves through the eyes of painters.
- [02:50]
A
We'll hear about it. Our listeners will hear about it when they listen to the lecture following our comments. But give us a little teaser on Copley's Paul Revere painting.
- [02:58]
B
Well, it was great fun to dig back into it. I was highly familiar with it. It's in the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston. And Boston was really Copley's turf up through the. The first couple of years of the Revolution. I hate to confess it, but he skipped the country to go to Britain in what he felt might be better opportunities. But anyway, while he was in Boston, as an aspiring artist, he did portraits of Loyalists as well as patriots. And of course, you know which side Paul Revere was on.
- [03:35]
A
Sure.
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This is.
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B
It's a portrait that shows Revere not like a gentleman with a suit coat and a waistcoat and all the trappings of aristocracy. No, it shows Paul Revere in shirt sleeves, sitting at a counter with the tools of his trade scattered before him and one of his hands holding a silver teapot as he gets to ready to engrave it. Not everyone realizes that Paul Revere was an artisan. He was a craftsman making silver objects.
- [04:14]
A
So we see a man at work who has also an appreciation for beauty and for record keeping.
- [04:22]
B
Well, true, absolutely true. And our listeners may know something about Paul Revere's engraving illustrating the Boston Massacre, but in this portrait, Revere's holding a silver teapot, getting ready to engrave an inscription upon it. And he was a beautiful calligrapher with an engraver's stylus. But more to the point, this is a portrait where he looks you straight in the eye and. And he makes eye contact with you. I am given to imagining that Revere hung this in the showroom of his shop, so that as you walk through the door, you might think, oh, there's the man himself. And in a way, a kind of advertising, here I am. This is what I do. And the highest quality.
- [05:13]
A
And he could still have people coming into his silver shop to this day looking at this beautiful painting. Sam, what do these paintings of statesmen and other heroes, presidents, generals, important figures in American life. What does the painter tell us? What are they teaching us about those men through their work?
- [05:33]
B
Well, I feel the impetus behind doing a presidential portrait in the first place is one of patriotism, of loyalty to the American experience. It becomes a kind of a twofold objective. As I see it, the portraitist must portray the man and he must portray the office. So there is content here, symbolism. Where is this individual in the historical scheme? What is their legacy, what they should be remembered for? But at the same time, that that might cause an artist to go kind of lofty, classical, heroic, and so on, the portraitist is also intent upon proving this is what this person looked like. This person has flesh and Blood. So to mix the symbolic overtures with the factual of a likeness, that's an interesting challenge. And the ones we selected for the course, I think, do a really fine job of balancing those twin objectives, accuracy.
- [06:47]
A
And honesty, with a little bit of artistic license to express the spirit of the man in the country.
- [06:54]
C
Right.
- [06:55]
B
You know, kind of suggestive of a narrative. This is what happened during my presidency.
- [07:02]
A
Outstanding. Because this course covers paintings, it's a visual medium, we have produced a book for you. It's a beautiful book that has many of the dozens of the paintings that Sam explains throughout the course, along with Professor Knecht's commentary about these paintings. If you would like to get a copy of the book American Paintings, you can go to Hillsdale. Edu course. That's Hillsdale Edu course to get a copy of the American Paintings book. Now we'll turn to Professor Knech's lecture. Lecture 1 of American American heroes.
- [07:46]
C
Let's start before the War for Independence with this painting of a silversmith from Boston. It's none other than Paul Revere. This painting was done in 1768 by. By John Singleton Copley, himself a Bostonian. This is a painting done masterfully, with great attention to all surfaces. Hair, skin, cloth, even a silver teapot and a shiny reflective countertop beneath the subject. Why get a portrait done in the first place? That was the sort of thing only upper class wealthiest would do. Well, in this case, Revere is aspirational, he's ambitious, and so is the artist, for that matter. They both want to be considered on par with High Gentleman. I think this painting quite likely didn't hang on the wall of his home, although he had a beautiful home in Boston, but rather hung in a showroom in his workshop. So if you walk through the door.
- [08:50]
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He'S glance over and think, oh, there's.
- [08:53]
C
Paul Revere looking through a window at me. But you realize after a second that, oh, no, it's a painting. It's oil colors on a flat surface. But it's so masterfully realistic. It isn't any wonder that Revere, himself, an amazing craftsman, took the trouble to find the best painter in Boston to. To do this job. His attention as a painter goes to realistically describing all surfaces, whether hair, skin, vest, sleeve, the teapot, a shiny countertop in front of him. Let's take a closer look now at his treatment of Paul Revere by moving in to see some of the details that have been so well worked out. Take his right hand here brought to his chin. You can see his fingernail, even the sort of pinkish color of that nail in crisp detail. As we look down further from his shoulder down to his elbow, this magnificent sleeve. I never get tired of enjoying the skill with which he rendered that cloth and the anatomy of cloth that that involves. Move the eye over here to the right in the teapot. It's so detailed that you see his fingers reflected in the polished smooth silver. And at the top of the teapot, you even can make out a little so called finial. It's a pineapple motif, a symbol of hospitality. Still further, there are sharply defined engraving tools on the varnished surface of this. This table. Notice that Revere's form fits rather neatly into an implied triangle moving up to his head as its apex. Down through the left arm holding the teapot, we can move over to the other side and complete that circuit more than once. But then, to underscore that feeling of a triangle form, we have the horizontal of this front ledge, the molding in the front edge of the tabletop. Notice the lighting in this picture. It's very strong, coming from an upper window, and it flows crosswise. Especially brilliant in its pooling on Revere's forehead and the upper two thirds of his face. The lower part in the jaw and chin area getting a little deeper. But that might be the result of a five o' clock shadow, as we're fond of saying. But at any rate, the contrast is so strong that it's created deep shadows in the right side of his face. His right eye is nearly lost in shadow, but that's of no worry to us, no concern. We know it's there. The power of the technique here is to use light and shadow to bring out the most important parts, this part of the face and hand, while allowing the form to turn in space, as the form would actually turn into deep shadows. That is true consistently of the treatment of the shirt, and with cast shadows in the forearm and hand, other shadows in the far sleeve, and so on. All very, very consistent and impeccably well observed. The way the contrast of lighting is brought out in this painting is not exactly original to Copley, but he handles it magnificently well. In the Italian Renaissance, artists first began to observe and record effects of light and shadow, directional light and so on. And they gave that the term chiaroscuro, which simply means, in Italian, light and shade. Copley understands this. His own observation has put him onto something that is handled with great expertise. This next painting was done during the Revolutionary War. Here we have Washington at Princeton, painted in 1779 by Charles Wilson Peale. This was painted two years after Washington and his army defeated the British in battles at Trenton and Princeton. This was a much needed morale boost for the Continental army after they had been disastrously embarrassed by defeats in the New York area. The battle at Princeton was something that could have gone either way were it not for George Washington getting on horseback and rallying his troops. When they started to retreat, he waved at them and yelled that they should turn and fight. And indeed they did, and they won the day. The Executive Council of Philadelphia asked Charles Wilson Peale to do Washington's portrait to honor him for that success. Peale knew Washington, they were friends, and the two of them must have gotten together and decided, let's do this as a large painting. The Executive Council probably wanted that as well. The canvas alone is 8ft tall. Washington was 6ft 2 inches. So therefore, when it was all said and done and you saw the painting, you felt like you were seeing the General standing before you in real life. So let's look at the painting and see how Peale pulled this off. First of all, there's a great deal of contrast in it from light to dark. As a savvy portraitist, Peale knew that you make the head of your subject and the neck region as well, the brightest notes in the whole painting. Everything else has to be toned down, sky and so on. There is color in the painting because. Because Washington has, of course, his dark general's coat on, but it's trimmed in gold brocade. And he also has a blue sash draped across his midsection that signifies his rank as commander in chief. Possibly competing a little bit for attention are his white britches, but they are toned down, his off whites, and that works. But now I want you to study Washington's standing pose with me. In the army, we all know about the pose of attention. Well, when painters and sculptors deal with standing pose, they don't want the figure to be stiff and vertically straight. They want a relaxed pose. And so over the centuries, artists have come up with what's called a contrapposto pose. When opting to do a standing figure head to toe, the artist has to think about what will look natural. The dumbest thing to do is a stiff standing straight up kind of pose where it might look like a soldier at attention and all you have is.
- [16:20]
B
A bunch of vertical lines.
- [16:24]
C
But gradually, over the centuries, since the ancient Greeks, artists have studied and excelled in their handling of a standing pose. We call this pose treatment contrapposto counterpoise. It suggests a lot more back and forth. So in this, it could be stated that the figure might go through a kind of S curve of axis of the spine and the major volumes of the pose. And when a figure is standing in contrapposto, the weight is shifted to one leg. That's the load bearing leg. It's locked at the knee. The non load bearing leg can bend at the knee with its relaxation. But that also means that the rest of the body, everything's interconnected. The rest of the body will respond with some shifting around. One shoulder may dip with another one being higher. The hips may kick up or cant up a little higher on one side. You get almost kind of a. A wedge implied here. Okay, here's the load bearing leg. I'm going to show it a little more straight, but there's a little taper as we come toward the feet. And how about giving the figure ahead? And part of the contrapposto handling takes into account that the head can turn one way or another. So then you tell your model how much to rotate the head. Do you want to make eye contact or have the head move off in another direction? One has to be attentive to where the knees wind up. They may not be on their same level. They would be if you're doing head on straight and stiff. But in this case, we want fluency throughout, a whole unbroken feeling of energy and the handling of weight from toe to head. And this is a most basic description of what embodies the contrapposto pose. But when we look at Peale's painting, something is a little peculiar here. He's taken his left leg and he's crossed it in front of his right leg. That doesn't happen in traditional contrapposto. This is a new twist, and I think it makes him look a little awkward, especially with his right arm swept out in akimbo, hand resting on his hip. And he's holding a hat, of course, but he feels like he'd tip over were it not for his left arm reaching out and steadying his pose as his arm and hand rest on that cannon. I think it's a British captured cannon. Elsewhere, as we scan the picture off to our left, we see a kind of a gray view. Some captured British prisoners at about eye level. And then on the horizon, the main campus building of Princeton Hall. This painting was a big hit, and so much so that Peale was commissioned to do eight copies of it, full size, full color paint and so on. That might seem a little peculiar to us today when we can just take a Photograph and run off multiple copies. But back then there was no color printing, no photographic processes for that matter. So if you had enough money and patriotism, you'd pay Peale to do a copy. Peale was a man of incredible energy. He actually outlasted three wives. Between them, they produced 18 children. And all of them were trained to be artists. Peale made sure that in one of his last sittings later on with Washington, that he took the kids with him with their sketchbooks so that as they launched their careers, they could each say that they had drawn George Washington from life. A great marketing boost. We now have George Washington again in the Athenaeum portrait done in 1796 by Gilbert Stuart. Well, right off we have to recognize it's unfinished. Why was it left unfinished? The reason might be this. It started with Martha Washington wanting a portrait of George and herself, probably to hang in Mount Vernon. They get Gilbert Stuart to come and start the project, and on a medium sized canvas, he goes to work depicting George. It could be surmised that Stuart felt that this was so successful, so true to life in this portrait study, that he wanted to keep it for himself. He wanted to take it home and use it for a future painting that he was commissioned to do that would be a life size George Washington. Anyway, he never delivered the painting to Martha. It stayed in its possession until his death. As you have guessed by now, this has become the image of George that is the basis of the $1 bill. As the years went forward, Stuart made many copies of this small canvas, just head and shoulders versions, the kind of thing that we call a bust length portrait. Seems as though every time he ran short on cash, he'd pump out another copy of the Washington portrait, maybe just finish it a little more, change the background and so on. He came to call these his $500 bills. About the Athenaeum that I spoke in, the title, Athenaeum refers to a museum, library, culture center in Boston where the painting wound up. So because there were so many portraits of Washington over the years, each one tends to carry a little tag for identification. Well, why is this a good painting? Well, Stuart was a painter who worked fluently and fairly fast. And he had a good great ability to sum up skin, complexion. Notice the rosiness in George's cheeks and even in his nose. Is this the result of riding a lot on horseback or was he reportedly a great lover of port wine? Now notice the set of George's mouth. It seems a little tight lipped, a little tense. You probably also know that George wore dentures. He had lost most of his teeth by adult age. His dentures, one after the other, tended to be a little uncomfortable and loose fitting. That might explain some of the sort of frozen look in George's face as we look at it. But overall his skin feels very pliable, very lifelike. Well, now we have another painting that is of George Washington with a little bit of a connection in the title. This is George Washington, the Lansdowne portrait. It was done in 1796 also by Gilbert Stuart. You can guess now that he probably used his Athenaeum unfinished study as a help in doing this portrait. But now I've used that word, Lansdowne. What's that? Well, it actually refers to the name of the person who commissioned this to be painted. And believe it or not, it was none other than a Britisher. Interesting irony here is that he was a supporter of the revolution even though for a couple of years he was Prime Minister of Britain under King George iii. Well, now this painting, like Peale's portrait of Washington is on a canvas which is 8ft high. And once again we can presume that George in his 6 foot 2 stature is presented life size. Now the former general is now at this year 1796, the newly inaugurated president. First president. The campaign for liberty is fulfilled. And now in peacetime, Washington has taken off the uniform and put on civilian clothes.
- [25:41]
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Hey there, it's Scott Bertram, host of the Radio Free Hillsdale Hour. On this week's program, we hear excerpts from a recent speech by Dr. Larry Arne, President of Hillsdale College title defending the American way of life. I'll talk with Ryan P. Williams, president of the Claremont Institute and editor of a new collection of tributes to Angelo Codovila. It's called Fighting Foreign and Domestic. And Nathan Herring, assistant professor of physics here at Hillsdale College, joins us to discuss the life and accomplishments of Sir Isaac Newton. All that this week on the Radio Free Hillsdale Hour. Find it at podcast hillsdale. Edu or wherever you get your audio, including YouTube.
- [26:29]
E
Hello America. I'm thrilled, thrilled to announce my new 10 part podcast series, Liberty and Learning with Mark Levin and Larry Arne. Join me and my dear friend Dr. Larry Arne, President of Hillsdale College, as we dive deep into the founding principles of our great nation. In these challenging times, understanding our history and the ideals of self government is more crucial than ever. We'll explore the core of America's current crises, the changes in our government and what it means for our lives and liberties. From education to borders, citizenship to the separation of powers, we'll cover it all. Tune in to Liberty and Learning with Mark Levin and Larry Arne of Hillsdale College. So subscribe now and join us on this wonderful journey to rediscover the principles that made America the freest, most prosperous nation in history. Don't miss it.
- [27:16]
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Listen right now to Liberty and Learning with Mark Levin and Larry Arn at podcast hillsdale.edu. that's podcast hillsdale. Edu, or wherever you find your audio.
- [27:34]
C
The father of our country, George Washington in this Lansdowne portrait. Obviously, to pull this together, Gilbert Stuart has relied upon the Athenaeum portrait that he's taken home. For reference, he's transcribed that head in fine fashion here, down to the color in the cheeks and the treatment of that solid and somber expression. George looks forward very directly, as if he's seeing off in the distance what is happening in the country before him. Notice that we could surmise that this is a wig that he's wearing. To my eye as a portraitist, I notice the sharp seam right here, which suggests to me that that's a wig, that separation between the temple region of the face and the fluffy wig. Elsewhere, though, notice that the lighting here is very frontal on his face, but turns into shadow at this region. It's a good example of what we're fond of calling Rembrandt lighting, where you get plenty of light but also sufficient shadow to give you contrast and achieve solidity as well as variety in the picture. The brightness of his head certainly makes his head emerge, without a doubt commanding our attention just as much as he is a commanding president. Now, a little bit of interesting active detail here in his cravat and a slice of light in that part that wraps around his neck. Those brightness features serve to accentuate his head and keep us here a good long time. But from there we're led elsewhere through the painting, through the line of his outstretched arm and this hand here, which is in a kind of approachable way, open at the palm, a shape which itself reads very well because of the way the fingers slightly curl and separate and the thumb up. But I'm sure it was a pose that Stuart was very careful about capturing. What about that hand? It's almost a hand of giving, of giving liberty to the Republic. The whole pose here of the outstretched arm and hand is a device borrowed from, of all things, ancient Roman sculpture, existing statues that the artist might have been familiar with during his travels in Europe. It is the emperor's pose of either giving an order or making a decree. So taking the two hands together, we can be reminded of a familiar subject in. In Christian art. The Last Judgment, in which Christ redeems the saved with his right hand, the righteous hand, while damning sinners to hell with his left hand. Stuart, who was well aware of the traditions of art, could very likely have had that sort of thing on his mind. Well, this device that starts us moving around the rest of the canvas takes us over to this quill set into an ink well. The quill might be a handy reminder of the documents that have gone into the creation of the nation, the Declaration, of course, and the Constitution, which George himself prominently signed. The inkwell beneath it, on close examination, looks like there's a ship on it. We were meant to understand that this is Noah's ark. How important is that? Well, it's as if it symbolizes how George and the country have brought themselves through a storm, the way Noah had taken his family. They've come out the other side after that terrible tumult of a flood and storm and are entering a bright new future. Continuing across this desk here, some documents rolled up, fairly obvious in their importance. We see a table leg whose top is adorned by carved gilded eagles, certainly one of the early appearances of the eagle as a national emblem. Beneath that, the table leg. The long, straight parts represent a bundle of. They look like pipes or dowel rods to our eyes. These actually are another borrowing from Roman prototypes. The Romans had a symbol like that called the Fasces, and the Fasces got across the idea that a single rod is like a single man who can be defeated because of his isolation. But when you get an army of them bound together with a concerted mission, they cannot be broken, they cannot be defeated. So a handy symbol of strength. Now, speaking of strength, let's turn to George's left hand. It is poised over the hilt of a sword, sheathed. Of course, he's in civilian garb, so he's not swinging a sword around, but that's a subtle reminder that he's commander in chief. Something Stuart does here that is a borrowing from. From European prototype paintings is an enormous swath of crimson fabric. As that sweeps away, and it does happen to create a line that brings us over to George, While in its breadth, along with the column serves to frame his head with very deep tones. Now, here we get a glimpse of a blue sky, very hopeful clearing sky, few little clouds remain, and then the beginning of a rainbow. And that's a little symbol of hope for the American Republic. I like now to contrast Stuart's Lansdowne portrait of George Washington to the other George, his adversary, King George iii, in a painting that was done a few years before in time for George III's coronation. When you see that painting, you see that young George III is awash in a sea of ermine furs, in gold brocade fabric and more. And his hand is on his hip, akimbo, and he leans in the other direction from that arm in such a way that he seems as though he's swaggering. This is a PA painting which is pretentious to our eyes at least, and the sort of thing that Stuart might have been aware of because he had studied in London. But now he, with his own taste and that of his new countrymen in the United States, wants to serve a more sober and dignified, less aristocratic look to his painting. Now, like Peale, made many copies of the the Princeton portrait. Stuart also found himself in demand to produce copies of this one. About seven more copies ensued from his studio, and one of those wound up being hung in the White House. And it escaped destruction, thank goodness, in the War of 1812. This was when Madison was in office and the British were setting foot on American soil, sailing up the Potomac river with Washington, D.C. as their target. The government saw them coming, and it was none other than Dolly Madison, the First lady herself and her staff who took the painting very, very heavy and large, to safety in a secret location in Washington. Washington and the British came in and they set fire to the White House and the Capitol as well. And later on, the White House reconstructed, especially with its interior, and the painting was rehung. I can only hope that Americans today would value works of art like this as much did Dolly Madison. Let's examine a fine portrait done of President Andrew Jackson, done by Thomas Sully in 1845. Now, following the trends in painting that were current at this time, Sully depicts Jackson in a manner that's both heroic and romantic. If you feel this painting looks dashing and glamorous, I'd have to agree. But I've learned that it was a posthumous portrait done the same year that Jackson died at age 78. There's a Matthew Brady photograph taken of Jackson that same year, and when you see it, you see that his face is lined deeply with creases of age. He looks almost decrepit. The portrait has glossed over any of those defects of aging that the artist must have seen. Like many portraitists, he understands that his job is to make the subject look better than they are, but make them look like they think they look. Jackson, a controversial president to Be sure both glorious and inglorious in his history. Let's take a breath and look a little more closely at this painting. One thing I think that stands out to our eyes is his hairstyle. He has sweeping locks. Even the photographs show he had a full head of hair in his face final years. But the artist has treated them as well coiffured locks which sweep in arcs and elegant S curves. And one even trails over the top of his forehead. It looks quite manipulated in a way. But those S curves in the design also harmonize with the big arcs and curves of that high collar of his coat, which is reminiscent of a general's coat from that time. Let's see that the painting was unfinished. I have to wonder if Sully was self consciously patterning this painting after the unfinished portrait that Stuart had done of George Washington. Fifteen years after the Jackson portrait, Abraham Lincoln sat for this portrait. A head and shoulders portrait done in 1860 by George P.A. healy. The famous beard has not yet sprouted. Lincoln's astonishing rise from backwoods lawyer to presidential nominee had generated enthusiasm for his likenesses. And in particular this portrait was commissioned by a Chicago businessman. And remember that the nomination for the Republican ticket had taken place in Chicago. Lincoln was basically from Illinois in his adult life. There was a measure of Chicago and Illinois pride bound up in this portrait. This is a manly portrait and it's interesting to put it up against Matthew Brady photograph at the same time which shows Lincoln looking a little gaunt and wary looking his hair a little messed up. But the Healy portrait is very tidily groomed. A little bit of lock of hair straying over his forehead. But otherwise every part of the painting has been very carefully rendered down through his shirt and tie, coat and so on. This is a head that's turned in what we call a three quarter view. The head is turned somewhat to the side. Can still see both eyes. You see a strong projection of the nose. And it's very sculptural in the modeling of the face with strong lighting that causes form sculpting shadows around his cheekbones and in his jawline. And it's a very sober painting and very solid and makes us remember the nickname Honest Abe. When posing the model for a portrait, the artist has three main options. We're beginning here with the profile where the in and out of the face is well expressed as forehead, nose, chin meet the background. Well, next we'll have the head turning.
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With a different model.
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And now we have a three quarter view. This is where the head is turned away a little bit. It's a very natural thing. It suggests mobility and life on the part of the sitter. The last pose in the Options is the frontal pose. That's where the symmetry of the face is best expressed. Left half matching the right half. So here you've seen the three main examples, which can be modified by a turn or a tilt of the head a little bit this way or that, or bringing the chin up or down. This is the peacemakers, done in 1868. This is another work done by George P.A. healy to honor Abraham Lincoln. This is three years after the horrible assassination, and like so many, Healy too was in mourning for the President. There were tributes pouring in from every direction, but Healy, who by then had known Lincoln rather well from that first portrait, decides to do a scene that was pivotal in the outcome of the Civil War. Let's take a closer look at Healy's the Peacemakers, starting with Lincoln, who leans forward in his chair, intently listening to what Sherman has to say. That's the most active public, and yet it still carries a decisive quality to it. Admiral Porter sits quietly contemplating what Sherman is trying to say. There is Grant next to Lincoln, and he is also focused on the words that Sherman is delivering. Here Sherman sits. He holds his hand forward to between thumb and forefingers in saying how if we do what we're deciding to do here today, we will have Lee between thumb and forefinger. Let me show you now how well the artist made it clear that Lincoln is the most important person in this scene in a design sense. We have the line of this window that brings us down to his head. We have the brightness of the sky behind it, much brighter than the other two windows. He leans forward. The diagonal of his shirt also energizes and calls our attention. His pose is, of course, thoughtful, but notice how he grasps the arm of that chair and leans into the thoughts. In an otherwise monochromatic painting, mostly grays and some soft browns, there's, of course, a spot of color, this glowing rainbow that appears behind Lincoln's head, another device for calling our attention to him. And of course, the message of hope embodied in this picture. It's the brightest spot of color in the whole thing. Let's turn now to a view of this painting as expressed by none other than a 20th century president who also knew war. Here's What President George H.W. bush said about it in 1990, when he himself was in the White House. And in it you see the agony and the greatness of a man who nightly fell on his knees to ask the help of God. The painting shows two of his generals and an admiral meeting near the end of the war that had pitted brother against brother. And outside, a battle rages. And yet what we see in the distance is a rainbow, a symbol of hope, of the passing of the storm. The painting's name, the peacemaker's. And for me, this is a constant reassurance that the cause of peace will triumph and that ours can be a future that Lincoln gave his life for, a future free of both tyranny and fear. Here's a commission portrait of Bush, the 41st president, with a glimpse of the peacemakers by Healy in the background behind him. I feel that the 41st president summed it up eloquently. We move forward to the turn of the next century. Another war hero and man of action takes the the White House. You can almost hear him say bully, if you know what I mean. We have Theodore Roosevelt, painted by John singer Sargent in 1903. Sargent was considered the finest painter not just in the United States, but in all of Europe. I'm happy to say that Sargent is one of my personal favorites, and I know that the same is true of many of my friends in the Portrait Society of America. Sargent was born in Florence, Italy, of American parents who decided to settle in Italy for health reasons. Now, much of his art career was spent in Europe, especially in France and London, but he came back to the States often to camp or hobnob with east coast folks. His reputation was solid, and he was given the job of doing the official portrait of President Theodore Roosevelt. TR had the artist stay as his guest in the White House for about two weeks with the president. Sargent tagged along through the residence to scope out good lighting, pose possibilities, and so on. Well, now, according to one account, here's what happened. In one of those walks together, Sargent and Roosevelt toured the White House while Sargent looked for proper light and good pose. As Roosevelt led the way up upstairs. So the story goes, he said, the trouble with you, Sergeant, is that you don't know what you want. No, replied the artist. The trouble, Mr. President, is that you don't know what a pose means. Roosevelt turned sharply back, grasped the newel post of the staircase and said, don't. I don't move an inch. You've got it now, replied Sargent. And that moment of irritation and anger is what Sargent fixed on, and that became the basis of this portrait. And Sargent was the artist capable of doing a painting that looks like it's done at white heat with incredible accuracy, resolve, and life. So, in a way, you could suggest that the big game hunter president was caught in the bullseye of the artist division. Well, what about the analysis here? Teddy stands there with one arm akimbo. That's kind of a familiar division. But that outstretched right arm of his with fingers slightly spread on the newel post knob, looks almost like a claw ready to tear the newel post right off the staircase. His head bores his eyes into you with that frontal pose very strongly modeled by a light source to the upper right, which flows down a diagonal, causing strong highlights in his forehead, nose, in his pince nez glasses, the white color of his shirt, of course, all notes designed to bring our attention to that powerful head. And the light also seems to suggest that with its border of shadow, that it takes our eye down to that commanding hand. You notice that it's a black coat. The artist was smart enough to avoid overdoing highlights in the black fabric. Therefore, you have a powerful shape of black, almost a flat silhouette, which delivers a lot of punch to the effect of this painting. Depends as much on its strong shadows as it does on the light. Well, when we think of portraits of leaders, especially presidents, we think usually of a portrait format, a vertical format. We all use Word document software. We know the difference in page setup between portrait and landscape. Well, here we have a portrait of John F. Kennedy done in 1967 by artist Jamie Wyeth. This is the kind of painting which breaks the mold of President's portraiture. It's in a landscape format, very, very broad, rectangular format with a very close up pose on the President's face and hand. Well, young Jamie Wyeth, who was only about 21 years old at the time, was friends with the Kennedy family. And he was in 1966 or so, asked to do a posthumous portrait of JFK. And he took the, the job very seriously, spent a long time doing pre studies. He hobnobbed with the Kennedy brothers, Bobby and Teddy, did sketches of them. He, he immersed himself in the Kennedy lives, and he also watched Zapruder tapes of the assassination. He. He did all kinds of pre studies, both in oil and sketching and so on, as he planned and sorted out his ideas. The result in this painting is stunning and surprising. We are brought into an intimate moment of contemplation, indeed anxiety and worry. The President's head in that rectangular frame is off center to the left, unmistakable and riveting in its brightness. His right hand is brought up to. Not to rest on his chin, the way Revere was shown by Copley, but in this case, Jamie knew that Jack Kennedy was in the habit of tapping his front teeth with his index finger when distracted. So he's captured that unusual moment and pose. Now, the President is shown looking toward us, but his eyes look pale, cast us to the left, as if fixed on some unseen problem. Some worry, most possibly shame and anxiety over the disastrous Bay of Pigs failed invasion of Cuba that had happened early in his presidency. I think the problems are more difficult than I had imagined they were. What else? Here, look at the way his dark jacket is shown. Again, like the Sergeant Teddy Roosevelt, the jacket is subdued. It creates a strong abstract shape, almost like a mountain peak that counterbalances the left bias position of Kennedy's head. Beyond all of this, surrounding his head and his shoulders, is this background, very plain, but a little bit of movement and texture, almost resonating with a feeling of emotion. You notice that gleam on his forehead. It's almost as though there's a little perspiration noticed here in the forehead and cheekbone. So, again, this is totally unglamorous. It is not a public face. It's a private moment. And we understand that when the painting was done and presented to the Kennedys that Bobby flatly rejected it. I think in retrospect, Bobby must have been overly bothered and in mourning in a depiction of his brother shown vulnerable and not completely in command. But it's a painting that I find personally to be memorable, powerful, full of its own measure of gravitas. Others agree Jamie's painting of Jack Kennedy has been put into the permanent collection of the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston, so the public can see it at any opportunity. Moving to recent memory, we now look at a painting of none other than President Ronald Reagan, done by Everett Raymond Kinsler in 1990. 1991. Now, Kinstler as artist was vibrant and engaging. He was one of the founders of the Portrait Society of America, which happened in about 1998. And he gave tireless service to that organization and to mentoring young artists that were up and comers until his death a few years ago. Now, Kinsler's style of working with a client was to do as much as possible the entire portrait from life sittings. Kinstler's reputation was such that he could insist on that approach. I know that oftentimes VIPs will only give an artist maybe an hour or two for a photo session and then send them on their merry way to their studios to copy photographs. But here we have a result which is brimming with action, brimming with even though it's a seated pose, and he looks relaxed. Reagan does, of course, has a winning grin, the sort of facial expression that he was known for. The setting here is the Truman Balcony of the White House, with white gleaming columns and pillars framing the head of Reagan. But his face really stands out beautifully against that rich blue sky that completely surrounds his head, but skewed a little bit to one side, looking a little more mobile and relaxed. Notice how his head is off center, a little bit closer to that right pillar. The architecture serves as a very convenient and sturdy frame for him. But his face especially stands out so beautifully, with skin tones and sunlight against the deep blue of a clear sky. Again, here's an artist who knows that you attempt to make the face the brightest note in the painting. The whites of the architecture are toned down a little bit so as not to take away from Reagan's countenance. I think his hands are done well, maybe a little bit on the small side, but any proportional problem like that is far made up for by the vitality of the technique. Everywhere the brush moves with energy, suggesting that the sky is alive. The architecture even has a feeling of a pulse without looking shaky. And it's a painting that I think is so gregarious, so amiable, it almost looks like Reagan has a little bit of a tan, possibly coming from his love of horseback riding. The traditions of doing presidential portraits continue, but I'm going to stop and settle on this portrait of the 43rd president, George W. Bush. This was painted in 2012 by the late, masterful artist John Howard Sandin. Beginning in the 1990s, I met Sandin a few times at Portrait Society events. In his final program for the society he covered. Working on this portrait of the 43rd president, he revealed that he did eight canvases in the project. Five of them were of George Bush himself. Three more were of Laura Bush. He kept making changes in each new canvas until both the President and the first lady and he, the artist, were each satisfied. Like Kinsler, this is a painting whose technique now in Sandin's hands, is lively. And yet the pose and the presentation is relaxed and formal. You see that some mobility and lifelike qualities in the pose are carried out by how George leans ever so slightly to the right. That movement toward the right is counterbalanced by the turn of his head as he looks to our left. And, of course, his right arm on our left side slants down to grasp a chair with the presidential seal easily visible. The setting here is the Oval Office. Sandin had experimented in many of his previous canvases of Oval Office settings, different props, different poses, and so on. But this is the one that everyone was happy with. With the final result, I want to take a closer look at George Bush's face here. The forward planes are in good, strong lighting. There's a shadow in the right eye socket drifting down the nose, which helps to break up that pool of light on his face, and it helps to model the sculptural form of his face. At the same time, when you look at the shadows on the right side of his face, they begin along the right side of his chin. They move up like a straight vertical pillar toward his cheekbone, grazing around the cheekbone, moving up into the forehead with a slight shift because of the turn of the head planes around the temple ridge. Even though the shadows are rich, they're not deadly dark. A secondary light has been bounced into the shadows to create a slightly bluish grayish tone, and that serves to to provide some complementary contrast to the much warmer tones of his face seen in the light. This is a really professional and effective way of handling the illumination of a head. And I think that for all of that skill and decision making, Sandin has produced a portrait which is very, very lifelike and worthy of our attention. Sandin himself said that there's nothing more difficult and demanding than painting. It calls for a state of physical and mental alertness throughout the session. Observe, analyze, respond with paint, all at white hot speed. This is the painting act. He also declared, and I've taken this one seriously. Never anything but your best paraphrasing, Edison. It takes about 2% talent and 98% hard work. Each of the artists in this series has put in that kind of hard work and long years of practice and performance. In addition, their works show credible likenesses with doses of interpretation here and there. They bring our patriots and presidents to life. They are invaluable documents for the nation's story.
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