Investigating a Peale in Paris

A portrait of George Washington, leaning on a cannon on the battlefield at Princeton, has hung in the Paris residence of the American ambassador to France since the 1980s. Some credited the painting to Charles Willson Peale, but its execution appeared to fall short of many of Peale’s portraits. In 2019, the Department of State’s Office of Cultural Heritage commissioned a study to research the picture’s provenance, evaluate its appearance and condition, and determine the artist's materials and techniques. Art historian Carol Soltis was enlisted for her experience with the work of Charles Willson Peale and conservator Emily MacDonald-Korth for her expertise in authenticating paintings using scientific methods.

Join the American Philosophical Society and the Library Company of Philadelphia in welcoming Carol Soltis and Emily MacDonald-Korth as they recount the investigation that took them from Philadelphia to Washington, DC, and ultimately, to Paris as they chased the trail of clues to the painting’s identity. Armed with archival research (including some unlikely sources), material evidence, and sharp observational skills, Soltis and MacDonald-Korth were able to confirm the painting was by Peale. 

At this event, we will screen a short film documenting the study and hear directly from Soltis and MacDonald-Korth about how they drew their conclusions. 

Emily MacDonald-Korth is a professionally-trained art conservator and a specialist in the scientific analysis of paintings. She received her MS from the Winterthur/University of Delaware Program in Art Conservation, with a certificate in the Conservation of Paintings. After several years at the Getty Conservation Institute, she founded Longevity Art Preservation, a laboratory for forensic analysis of art; acquired Western Center for the Conservation of Fine Arts or WCCFA, a paintings conservation laboratory serving the western states; and invented Art Preservation Index®, a patented stability rating system for fine art. She has worked on paintings and built heritage from old masters and new including portraits of George Washington by Charles Willson Peale and Gilbert Stuart. Her discovery of Jean-Michel Basquiat’s colorless UV-fluorescent technique led to a University of Delaware-based Basquiat and Warhol technical research project. Her recent publications include “Investigations of Historic Finishes: Finding the Earliest Extant Color and More” in the Association for Preservation Technology Bulletin and “Technical Imaging for Private Practice Conservators” in the Journal of the American Institute for Conservation. She is a prolific public-speaker and educator and has been featured in numerous media outlets such as the New York Times, BBC, The Atlantic, Smithsonian Magazine, The Art Newspaper, and Artnet News. She is currently the President and Chief Conservator-Scientist at Longevity Art Preservation in Miami, FL and WCCFA outside Denver, CO.

Carol Eaton Soltis is Project Associate Curator in the Philadelphia Museum of Art’s Department of American Art. She holds a doctorate in the History of Art from the University of Pennsylvania and has curated exhibitions and written extensively on the Peales. As a member of the Smithsonian’s Peale Family Papers, at the National Portrait Gallery, she assembled a catalogue raisonné of Rembrandt Peale’s work. Her most recent book, The Art of the Peales presents PMA’s unparalleled Peale Collection of oil portraits, watercolor on ivory miniatures, still life pictures, landscapes, drawings and prints by fifteen different Peale artists spanning the 1770’s into the 20th century. Written as a narrative, to highlight the connections between the individual artists and their work, it includes a detailed bibliography. She is also a member of the digital database project, Reconstructing Philadelphia’s Earliest Museums, 1774-1827 led by Dr. John Van Horne, Emeritus Director of The Library Company of Philadelphia. Their project will document the contents of the museums of Pierre Eugène Du Simitière and Charles Willson Peale and is hosted by the American Philosophical Society.

Photo © U.S. Department of State/Office of Cultural Heritage (OBO)