Pitt, Peale & the Patriots Symposium
A Collaborative Effort of Stratford Hall Historic Preserve, Preservation Northern Neck and Middle Peninsula, and Westmoreland County Museum. A Northern Neck 250 event.
In the walk-up to commemorations of this nation’s 250th anniversary, join us in the Stratford Hall Council House for a symposium on patriot and painter Charles Willson Peale’s portrait of British statesman William Pitt. Edmund Jenings of Maryland and London gifted the portrait to the “gentlemen [and women] of Westmoreland” through the offices of Richard Henry Lee. The painting hung at Lee residences Chantilly and Stratford Hall before settling ultimately in the Westmoreland County Museum, where it hangs today. An exquisite reproduction painting and complementary frame to scale now adorns the parlor at Stratford Hall. Come experience this provocative outsized portrait, described by Peale biographer Charles Sellers as an “inflated political cartoon,” and hailed by contemporaries as a “masterly performance.” Learn more about Peale’s spectacular commemorative portrait of Pitt’s defense of colonial liberties.
Speakers will focus on the historical context and significance of the Pitt portrait and commission, its political and art historical contents, and the art and value of its reproduction for Stratford Hall.
The one-day symposium opens at 1 p.m. with a keynote by Dr. J. Patrick Mullins, Associate Professor of History and Director of Public HIstory at Marquette University. A reception at the Inn at Montross and viewing of the Peale original concludes the day. Distinguished speakers include Lucinda Dukes Edinberg (Curator, Hammond-Harwood House Museum), Bradley Stevens (realist painter and accomplished portraitist), F. Carey Howlett (Conservator of Historic Furniture and Architectural Interiors), and Sandy Jensen (Conservator of Gilded Objects).
Program & Reception Schedule
1:00 - 2:15 p.m.: J. Patrick Mullins
2:30 - 3:30 p.m.: Lucinda Dukes Edinberg
3:45 - 4:45 p.m.: Bradley Stevens
5:00 - 6:00 p.m.: Carey Howlett & Sandy Jensen
6:30 - 7:30 p.m.: Reception and William Pitt Portrait Viewing at the Inn at Montross
Seating is limited, so reserve your space now! Traveling from a distance to attend? Stratford Hall offers high-quality and affordable accommodation; contact (804) 493-1967 for details or book your room here: www.stratfordhall.org/lodging.
$30 General Admission
$20 for Friends of Stratford, Preservation Northern Neck & Middle Peninsula members, and Westmoreland County Museum members
$10 for Students
Stratford Hall brings together people from around the world to experience two-thousand acres of natural and human history, preserved and presented so that we can all learn from the courageous struggles of our ancestors, taking inspiration both from what they endured and what they accomplished. There are few places in America where people can travel down small, rural roads to arrive at a vast site that preserves so many aspects of early-American life, from the Great House where the influential Lee family helped to forge a new nation, to the fields worked by enslaved Africans, to the waters of the rivers that fueled trade, to the ground, which still yields secrets about the people and animals that lived before.
Come experience this extraordinary place and learn about a layered history that began millions of years ago - a history that continues to educate, inspire, and influence Americans to the present day.
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