Image source: Wikimedia Commons (Public domain). View source
The Artist in His Museum
Charles Willson Peale · Rococo & Neoclassicism
- Artist
- Charles Willson Peale (1741–1827)
- Date
- 1822
- Dimensions
- 263.5 x 202.9 cm
- Medium
- Oil on canvas
- Location
- Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, Philadelphia, United States
In this large self-portrait, the 81-year-old Charles Willson Peale lifts a heavy red curtain to invite us into his museum in Philadelphia. Behind him stretches a long gallery lined with cases of stuffed birds, minerals and portraits of American heroes, and visitors stroll and marvel.
A closer look
Peale founded one of the first public museums in the United States, combining natural history and art to educate citizens of the young republic. In the foreground lie the tools of a taxidermist, a stuffed wild turkey, and the huge bones of a mastodon, which Peale had excavated in New York State in 1801, the first such skeleton ever reconstructed. A woman at the right throws up her hands in astonishment at the giant skeleton. The painting is both a self-portrait and an advertisement for the museum, presenting the artist as a showman of knowledge.