Over 80 paintings presented thematically by Thomas Sully (1783–1872), one of nineteenth-century America’s most prolific artists, will be on display starting October 11, 2013 at the Milwaukee Art Museum, in the exhibit, “Thomas Sully: Painted Performance.”
Sully painted over 2,300 works through a career that spanned 70 years. The child of working actors, his first commissioned works were of celebrities of the time. Some of his best-known portraits include President Andrew Jackson, as seen on the twenty-dollar bill, and of a young Queen Victoria.
The exhibit took over eight years to design and launch. “Hopefully other people will latch on to things we brought to the surface,” said Carol Eaton Soltis, Project Associate Curator at the Philadelphia Museum of Art’s Center for American Art.
The “Thomas Sully: Painted Performance” exhibit feature paintings from public and private collections across the U.S. and Greet Britain. The exhibit will run through January 5, 2014 at the Milwaukee Art Museum.
