- Good evening ladies and gentlemen.
And welcome on this rainy
day to the last in the series
of lectures on the exhibition
Canova's George Washington.
Throughout the exhibition, we
decided to focus on the key
characters who made the story
the extraordinary story it is,
starting with Antonio
Canova himself, the artist,
continuing with George Washington.
And we had a wonderful lecture
from one of the curators
at Mount Vernon focusing on
the image of the president.
But tonight, last but
definitely not least,
we focus instead on the
person that was really behind
this whole story and
behind the commission.
The person whose letter, in January 1816,
created the spark for
what happened subsequently
in the next five, six years of
the carving of the sculpture
and its arrival in North Carolina.
And that of course is the
president, writer, intellectual,
architect, there's a lot of ways
in which we could describe
him, Thomas Jefferson.
And I'm delighted to
introduce tonight's speaker,
who is really one of the world
experts on Thomas Jefferson,
Susan Stein, who is the Richard Gilder
Senior Curator at Monticello,
the extraordinary house
that Jefferson created,
on a number of occasions,
over and over again,
always perfecting it and improving it,
near Charlottesville in Virginia.
Still one of the greatest building sites
for the history of this country
and really in the world.
Dr. Stein has been a major force
in the comprehensive
presentation, restoration
and interpretation of
Monticello since 1986.
She trained as an art historian
at the University of Chicago,
and she did her graduate
work in American history.
Before coming to
Monticello, she was the head
of the Octagon Museum in Washington, DC.
She has been the project
director of the interpretive
elements of the Rubenstein
Visitor Center at Monticello,
which is comprised of four exhibitions
and the film Thomas Jefferson's World,
which provides the
introduction to any visit
to the site of Monticello today.
Ms. Stein's accomplishments
include also the landmark
1993 exhibition with the
accompanying catalog,
The Worlds of Thomas
Jefferson at Monticello,
which saw the return of
more than 150 artworks
which had been dispersed
after Jefferson's death
coming back to Monticello
for that exhibition.
And also the Slavery at
Jefferson's Monticello exhibition,
which took place instead
at the Smithsonian.
She has co-authored several
books on the president,
including Thomas Jefferson's Monticello,
and the guidebook to the site,
and has contributed a large
number of essays to museum
catalogs and journals which
are too long to list tonight.
But have shed incredible new light
on the figure of this
giant for American studies.
Her main research interests involve
pretty much the world of material culture
around Monticello, the decorative arts,
and the great works of art acquired
by the president in France.
She recently oversaw the
restoration and the furnishing
of Monticello's upper floors,
Jefferson's private suite,
and the outdoor exhibition
on Mulberry Row,
which recreated two of the lost structures
that were there that were
subsequently destroyed,
and restored others.
She's currently working
on plans for a major
new exhibition which will
be called Thomas Jefferson,
Fashioning America, which
will be designed to explain
how Jefferson planted the
arts in the United States.
Ms. Stein is also a governor
of the Decorative Arts
Trust and an honorary member
of the Virginia Society of Architects.
And her talk tonight
will very much be about
Jefferson's great role for
the arts in the United States.
And it's entitled Thomas Jefferson,
Planting the Arts in America.
I would like to remind you at this time
to silence your phone, and
a reminder that the lecture
is streamed live and will be
available online subsequently.
And the exhibition will also
remain open for an extra
half hour at the end of the lecture.
So you can enjoy the exhibition
if you haven't seen it yet.
And the exhibition will be
on until September 23rd,
before traveling to Italy,
and it will be on view
from November onwards in
Possagno in the Veneto.
So please join me in
welcoming Susan Stein.
(audience applauds)
- Thank you Xavier for that
great and generous introduction.
And the honor to speak at
one of my favorite museums.
What a fantastic exhibition and superb
catalog you've produced.
Your impeccable
scholarship tells the story
of the commission of Canova's
sculpture of George Washington
including the role that
Jefferson played in it.
This evening, I will explain why
Jefferson's opinion mattered
and determined the choice of Canova.
Thank you family, friends and Jefferson
enthusiasts for being here.
As you might expect at Monticello,
we believe that Thomas
Jefferson is the central
figure of the American Revolution.
Understanding Jefferson is fundamental
to understanding America.
Jefferson epitomizes the
aspirations of his era,
as well as its failures.
Today we think about
Jefferson as a slaveholder
as well as a radical
spokesman for human freedom.
After drafting the
Declaration of Independence,
Jefferson became a nation builder.
He dedicated himself
to securing the fragile
American experiment in self-government
and the future of the country
that he had helped to found.
And tonight, we're gonna
step away from politics
to consider another aspect of
Jefferson's nation building,
the formative role he played in shaping
American art and architecture.
He saw the arts as a way of
creating an American identity,
and a lasting civilization.
The architect Benjamin Henry Latrobe
credited Jefferson with
planting the arts in America.
Writing him in 1813, it
is no flattery to say
that you have planted
the arts in your country,
thus the title of this talk.
Now to forge a new nation
and to assure the future
of this young republic,
Jefferson fashioned himself
the politics of America
and its artistic culture.
He committed himself to
improving American life
and to sustaining that nation.
He considered the arts
an essential component
of nationhood and civilization.
He believed that the
arts, music, painting,
sculpture and architecture were valuable
for their inherent qualities,
and that they would improve
the worldwide reputation
of the young nation
as well as contribute to
creating an American culture.
Portraits of the founders,
history painting,
and natural phenomena were a means
of forging an American identity,
and creating an American narrative
distinct from Great Britain.
He was all about cultural transmission.
And not everyone shared Jefferson's view.
To shed tyranny and its trappings,
some people feared that the
arts could pose a threat.
After learning about
John Trumbull's murals
for the United States Capitol in 1817,
a very skeptical John Adams told Trumbull,
quote, "You will please
to remember that the Burin
"And the pencil, the
chisel and the trowel,
"Have in all ages and
countries of which we have
"Any information been enlisted on the side
"Of despotism and superstition."
He went on to say that
architecture, sculpture,
painting and poetry have conspired
against the rights of mankind.
So he's reacting to the key masterworks
of Western civilization in that way,
thinking that the church and the state
are all evidence of tyranny.
So rather than praise
Trumbull's history paintings,
Adams concluded, "I see no
disposition to celebrate
"Or remember, or even curiosity to inquire
"Into the characters, actions
or events of the revolution."
You're supposed to gasp.
(audience laughs)
So Jefferson's views could not possibly
have been more different.
Trumbull's Declaration of Independence
was begun in Jefferson's house in Paris.
Jefferson understood
that the arts conveyed
ideas and messages, but
believed that they could serve
the public good within the new nation,
as well as beyond its borders.
Tonight, we will explore how and why
Jefferson's opinion
determined the commissioning
of Canova, and outline the seminal role
that Jefferson played in the
arts in the young republic.
So as Xavier has told
us, in December 1815,
exactly 30 years after
the Virginia Assembly
commissioned a sculpture
of George Washington
by Jean Antoine Houdon,
the general assembly
of North Carolina decided
to commission a sculpture
of George Washington for
the new North Carolina
state Capitol in Raleigh.
Governor William Miller
and Nathaniel Macon
oversaw the project, and
asked two North Carolina,
Miller asked two North Carolina senators,
Macon and James Turner, to find out who
the sculptor should be,
whether marble could be found
in the United States, and
the cost of the commission.
Essentially, who should we hire
and how should we carry this out?
So Nathaniel Macon jumped into this.
And he sought the advice
of knowledgeable people,
including two architects
in Washington, DC,
William Thornton and Benjamin Latrobe,
both at work on the construction
of the United States
Capitol with its decorative
architectural sculpture.
Macon naturally turned to
them and to Thomas Jefferson.
Senator Macon knew
Jefferson, Macon had been
the Speaker of the US
House of Representatives
for part of Jefferson's
presidency from 1801 to 1809.
So surprisingly to us, and painfully too,
no one seriously considered
American sculptors.
And they instead looked to Europe.
Jefferson's friend, the
philosophe, the Portuguese
Abbe Correa de Serra
opined that there, quote,
"That there is not a single sculptor
"In the United States competent to execute
"The work in the style contemplated."
While there were abundant
accomplished American painters,
sculpture, at least in the,
got off to a slower start.
And the name of William
Rush, a Philadelphia carver
of ships' figureheads turned
sculptor never came up.
Wood was his medium, and the sculpture
in North Carolina was to be marble.
Rush had modeled portraits in clay,
but these had never
been carved into stone.
Apparently no one spoke
up for his recent portrait
of George Washington,
although Latrobe was certainly
familiar with Rush, because they were both
members of the same society of artists.
Another Philadelphia sculptor named Miller
was briefly mentioned,
and the New York firm
of Norris and Caine offered its
services to Governor Miller.
But this went nowhere, and they
had volunteered themselves.
Latrobe and Thornton each
proposed someone named
Giuseppe Valaperta, an Italian sculptor
who had recently arrived
in Washington from France
to work on the US Capitol.
He had an idea to create a
huge monument to liberty.
It was never realized.
And he took wax portraits,
made profile portraits, too.
Latrobe recommended Valaperta, who was,
at best, a second rate
choice, because he believed
that the top artists
would not be available.
Canova and Thorveldson, he wrote, quote,
"Had no equal and whose abilities
"It is almost impossible to purchase."
A serious contender for
the project would surely
have been another Italian
sculptor, Giuseppe Ceracchi.
If he had remained in America,
not returned to Europe,
and not been guillotined in 1801.
(audience laughs)
For participating in a
plot against Napoleon.
So he was definitely out
of the picture by 1816.
So Ceracchi had made two visits
to America in 1791 and 92,
and 1794 to 95, making
widely admired portraits
of George Clinton and Alexander Hamilton.
And of course of George Washington.
He took Jefferson's portrait,
which unfortunately is missing,
so you'll just have to
look at Washington's.
That it was a colossal bust
of Jefferson sent from Italy,
and it is now lost and it was
displayed in Monticello's hall
and then went to the US
Capitol until it was destroyed
by fire tragically on December 24th, 1851.
And William Thornton called it unrivaled
even compared to the, to the
Houdon bust of Jefferson.
He said I know of none that
I admire so much as that.
So Jefferson's powerful
recommendation for Canova
came from Monticello
on January 22nd, 1816.
And this is where Jefferson
lived after retiring
from the presidency in 1809.
And Jefferson begins his
argument for Canova by saying
that the work cannot be
made in the United States.
Quote, "I do not know that
there is a single marble
"Statuary in the US qualified to undertake
"This monument of gratitude and taste
"Besides no quarry of statuary stone."
So no American sculptor
and no American stone.
He went on to emphatically
state who should make it.
"There can be but one answer to this.
"Old Canove of Rome, no artist in Europe
"Would place himself in a line with him.
"And for 30 years within my knowledge."
Now I want you to imagine
within my knowledge underscored.
"He has been considered by all
Europe as without a rival."
So not only does Jefferson embrace Canova
without ever having seen his
work, I need to add quickly,
but he also dismisses, disses
Houdon, his earlier favorite,
who was very much alive in 1816.
For the record, Jefferson was surrounded
by Houdon at Monticello.
He owned his own bust.
And seven others, seven
other portrait busts,
and a small Diana.
He had this terracotta
patinated, I'm not showing you
the terracotta patinated plaster,
but that's what was at Monticello.
And he displayed four Houdon
busts in the tea room.
You see the tea room here.
And here are better photos of the busts.
And in Monticello's hall,
Jefferson displayed,
and you can see them
perched on brackets there,
he had Turgot,
and Voltaire, and then he had Hamilton
on the far right, after Ceracchi.
Moreover, Jefferson's
praise of Canova contradicts
the historical record
regarding the selection
of the eminent Houdon for
the portrait of Washington
commissioned for the Virginia
state Capitol in 1785.
Jefferson was instrumental
in the commission
for the building that he would design.
Jefferson's endorsement of Canova
seemingly puts him at
odds with his 1785 claim
that Houdon, he writes then,
possesses the reputation
of being the first statuary in the world.
And notice that he doesn't
say first statuary in France,
he says first statuary in the world.
So.
So Jefferson wrote the Virginia
governor, Benjamin Harrison,
that there could be no
question as to the sculptor
who should be employed, the reputation
of Monsieur Houdon being
unrivaled in Europe.
Again, the larger world.
And if you knew Paris at that time,
Houdon's work was ubiquitous.
In 1816, Jefferson's
recollections, however,
seem to suggest that Canova was indeed
a contender for the
Virginia state Capitol.
Houdon, he says, was the
first artist in France
and being willing to come
over to take the model
of the general which we could not
have got Canova to have done.
If only they had asked him perhaps.
Jefferson however was accurate
about Houdon's travel.
He reported then that
Houdon said the sculpture
cannot perfectly be done from a picture,
and thus traveled to Mount Vernon,
staying for two weeks to make a low fired
clay model and a life mask.
So how did Jefferson know about Canova?
When did he first know about Canova?
What exactly does he mean within,
when he writes within my own knowledge?
Well, I will hazard the
following speculation.
That he probably knew about
him through Filippo Mazzei,
his friend and a Florentine
merchant, surgeon,
and sometime Albemarle neighbor.
Albemarle county neighbor of Jefferson's.
Or it might have been through
Maria Hatfield Cosway,
an English artist raised
in Leghorn, Italy, Livorno.
And a special friend of Jefferson.
And on his, to further get this across
that he had never really
seen Canova's work,
on his 103 day trip mostly through France,
he traveled only briefly
to Genoa and Milan in 1787.
He apparently never met Canova or saw
any of Canova's work
in Italy or in France.
Canova's name first appears
in Jefferson's papers in 1805,
when Mazzei writes that he
has scouted out two sculptors
for work on the US Capitol.
One is Carlo Franzoni.
I have heard in Florence and Rome
several eminent sculptors and painters say
that Franzoni will soon
be a second Canova.
Canova's name doesn't pop up
again until nine years later,
in December of 1814, again from Mazzei,
but this time through the American
counsel on Leghorn, Thomas Appleton.
Appleton wrote Jefferson about
Ceracchi's bust of Washington,
telling him, quote, "Those
Americans who have seen it,
"And among the number is
our friend Mr. Mazzei,
"Universally pronounce it
as an incomparable likeness.
"And I have already copied
various busts in marble
"By a sculptor in the city and
who in this branch of the art
"Is perhaps little inferior
to Canova of Rome."
So he has that reference in his mind.
In his letter to Nathaniel Macon,
Jefferson further suggested
that Ceracchi's highly
admired bust of Washington should
be used as a model for Canova.
Jefferson also knew that for a sculptor,
3D is much better than 2D.
He wrote Macon, quote,
"No sculptor living,
"Except Canove, and if
he, Ceracchi, had lived,
"Would have rivaled him.
"His style had been formed on
the fine models of antiquity
"And he had caught their
ineffable majesty of expression."
Ceracchi's marble, Jefferson thought,
was the best effigy of
Washington ever executed.
So he's going, apparently
going out on a limb,
Jefferson that is, because
he hasn't seen Canova's work,
and he also somehow has intuited
that his work indeed is classical.
And Jefferson does
favor neo-classical art,
writing Roman tastes, genius,
and magnificence excite ideas.
But how he knew Canova was a
neo-classicist is a mystery.
And I'm guessing that Ceracchi in 1791, 92
was Jefferson, could have
been Jefferson's source.
So Jefferson has some
other advice to share.
And he forcefully tells Macon that, quote,
"As to style or costume,
I am sure the artist
"And every person of taste in Europe
"Would be for the Roman,
the effect of which
"Is undoubtedly of a different order,
"Our boots and regimentals
have a very puny effect."
So here he is, no longer
pleased with the sculpture
that made Jefferson's reputation.
He's kind of not so happy with that.
And he did see that sculpture.
He traveled to Richmond in his retirement.
And did see it.
So as to the Houdon portrait,
Washington's opinion
was invited, and he
favored a modern costume
rather than Roman dress.
And Jefferson got in touch
with the American painters
Benjamin West, John Singleton
Copley, John Trumbull
and Mather Brown, all in London,
and they weighed in for modern attire.
So in August 1787, Jefferson
writes to Washington,
"I think a modern in an antique dress
"Is as just an object of
ridicule as a Hercules or Marius
"With a periwig and chapeau bras."
Imagine that.
And here I've paved the
way for your imagination.
(audience laughs)
So, yes, you're supposed
to laugh, thank you.
So.
As to the stone, Jefferson
is adamant that the stone
should be from Carreras,
that is to say of a marble,
pure white and in blocks of sufficient
size without vein or flow.
No US quarry, he believed,
had been opened with adequate stone.
Latrobe and Thornton thought otherwise.
So did Governor Miller
listen to Jefferson?
Well, why did he listen, yes he did.
Jefferson was the acknowledged authority.
When posted in France as
America's minister to France
from 1784 to 89, Jefferson
designed the temple fronted
Virginia state Capitol in Richmond,
thereby putting a face on
American public architecture,
a recognizable classical
image tested by time.
His inspiration was the
Maison Carree in Nimes,
which he called the most precious morsel
of architecture left to us by antiquity.
The centerpiece of the
Capitol was Houdon's
influential portrait of Washington,
and the obvious precedent
for North Carolina.
But there is more to the
Virginia state Capitol.
Governor Miller might have known
that Jefferson's capitol rotunda
was to house a pantheon
of American worthies.
Jefferson included brief brick niches
for portraits of America's heroes,
arguably the first truly
public gallery in America.
The second portrait to be
commissioned was Lafayette,
and Jefferson was
involved in that as well.
So what prepared Jefferson for his role
as arbiter of American taste?
He was both politically
and artistically creative,
his architectural designs contributed to
his reputation as a proponent of the arts
before he arrived in France.
A self-taught architect,
Jefferson designed
his Palladio-inspired
plantation home, Monticello,
seen here in an early drawing.
When the Marquis de
Chastellux visited in 1782,
he observed that Jefferson
was the first American
to have consulted the fine arts to know
how to shelter himself from the weather.
And of course, Monticello,
that Monticello one was never finished.
And after five years in
France, Jefferson came back,
revised it, expanded it,
and this is pretty much
the Monticello that we know today.
What you probably don't
know, what you do know,
is that Jefferson drafted the
Declaration of Independence,
but you probably don't know
that he designed the writing box
on which he wrote those powerful words.
He went on to design dozens of objects,
from a footed goblet, a
clock supported by obelisks,
furniture and even a sports car.
Beginning in 1784, just as he was about
to depart for France,
Jefferson began to assemble
one of the first sizeable art collections,
including American art, which
he first displayed in Paris
and then in Philadelphia,
Washington and at Monticello.
Jefferson was an arts activist.
He called himself an
enthusiast for the formation
of an artistic and architectural identity.
In 1785, while minister,
he wrote to James Madison,
the words which I often quote.
He says, "I am an enthusiast
on the subject of the arts,
"But it is an enthusiasm
of which I am not ashamed,
"As its object is to improve
the taste of my countrymen,
"To increase their reputation,
to reconcile to them
"The respect of the world
and procure them its praise."
So first of all, the first
thing to notice about this
is that the state of the arts in America
was so little respected that Jefferson
had to apologize for having one at all.
I guess he felt surrounded
by John Adamses.
He wanted the young nation to be
recognized and respected by other nations.
While in Paris, Jefferson immersed himself
in the diplomatic life and French culture,
where he came to know
the diplomatic court,
philosophes and artists,
Houdon and David among others.
He wrote to an Italian
friend in Williamsburg
at the College of William and Mary,
"How much I enjoy their
architecture, sculpture,
"Painting, music, I should want words.
"It is in these arts that they shine."
Jefferson arrived as a trade minister,
and left as an ambassador
of French culture,
turned ambassador of American culture.
With all his, quote, "With
all his extraordinary
"Versatility of character and opinions,"
Henry Adams wrote, "Seemed
during his entire life
"To breathe with perfect satisfaction
"Nowhere except in the liberal,
"Literary and scientific air of Paris."
Jefferson's early knowledge of art,
like architecture, came
principally from books.
He famously studied Palladio's
four books of architecture,
which he called his bible.
He had five different editions,
and they are well described
in the wonderful catalog produced
with the Canova exhibition.
And he also read about art.
And I can almost safely
say that no president since
has studied American art, or studied art,
in the way that Jefferson did.
In about 1771, Jefferson prepared a list
of desired works from Monticello,
mostly sculpture, all classical works.
And they were derived from
the books that he read,
mostly this work by Jonathan, by Spence.
An early design for Monticello, in fact,
included two niches for
classical sculpture.
But these were never completed.
In Williamsburg, in 1773,
Jefferson saw copies
of Old Masters by Matthew Pratt,
a student of Benjamin West.
Now, Jefferson approached his time abroad
as a chance to immerse himself
in French culture and to
apply what he had learned
to the advancement of the
young American republic.
His experience and his
enlightenment vision
turned him into an
advocate for American art.
And French culture became
a model for building
the American nation and
an American identity.
In Paris, Jefferson leapt
into the artistic scene.
He probably saw all three
of the biannual exhibitions
of the salons of the Royal
Academy of Painters and Sculptors
at the Louvre, where the latest works
of the members of the Academy
were exhibited frame to frame.
Jefferson for sure
attended the salon of 1787,
and urged John Trumbull,
the painter then studying
with Benjamin West in
London, to come and see it.
And Jefferson sent
Trumbull a printed catalog
with notes of the treasures.
And Jefferson wrote about
the Death of Socrates,
"The best thing is the
Death of Socrates by David,
"And a superb one it is.
"Five pieces of antiquities by Robert
"Are also among the foremost."
Of the 330 works packed
into the 1787 salon,
Jefferson particularly
admired these things,
and they chronicled some of the monuments
Jefferson saw on his trip through France
from February 28th to June 10th of 1787.
And yes, there will be a quiz later.
About those dates.
From Lyons to Nimes, I have been nourished
with the remains of
Roman grandeur, he wrote.
He also saw, in that
salon, seven sculptures
by Houdon without rivalship,
again, without rivalship
the first statuary of this age.
And two of those exhibited works were ones
he had had a role in, of
Lafayette and Washington.
He outfitted his residence in
Paris, the Hotel de Langeac,
to represent his country
in a dignified manner.
To increase the reputation
of his countrymen.
He did not want to be
seen as a provincial.
He assembled an extensive art
collection of some 63 works.
Significant cultural capital that would
return to the United States.
From auctions and shops, he bought copies
of canonical Old Master paintings,
largely representing Western civilization,
with a strong emphasis
on biblical subjects,
including the miraculous, even though he
did not believe in miracles.
His collection included
copies of works by Italian
renaissance masters
Leonardo, Raphael, Titian
and northern renaissance artists too.
Most of these works were
acquired very rapidly,
within six months from
September, excuse me,
November 1784 to May of 1785.
He paid little for each one,
sometimes less than four livres.
They were priced like posters.
He wrote a fellow American
that painting was, quote,
"Too expensive for the
state of wealth among us."
With so little European art
in America in the 1780s,
Jefferson's collection of copies
is particularly important
within that American context.
And art historians have mostly focused
on these European
artworks because it's one
of the largest collections in America,
and they have really not
paid so much attention
to America's pioneering
collection of American subjects.
In effect, with his art
collection, he created a traveling,
he created an exhibition tour,
displaying his collection
in Paris first in the late 1780s,
in Philadelphia in the 1790s,
and Washington during his
presidency, from 1801 to 09.
And Monticello thereafter.
Jefferson had American
representation in mind
as he left for France
in the spring of 1784.
He likely had seen Du Simetiere's
short-lived museum in Philadelphia,
he was a Swiss emigre artist
and drawing tutor to Jefferson's daughter.
And he exhibited fossils, coins,
prints, rocks, and everything he could get
his hands on related to
the American Revolution.
And he also made 13
profile portraits of heroes
of the revolution, which
were engraved in France.
And Jefferson probably saw them.
So before leaving, before leaving,
Jefferson commissioned the
American painter Joseph Wright,
born in Bordentown, New
Jersey, to paint a copy
of his 1783 portrait of Washington.
And Wright had studied
with West in London.
So creating, bringing a
portrait of Washington
was in Jefferson's mind early on.
And shortly thereafter,
between 1784 and 89,
he acquired, Jefferson
acquired 23 portraits,
16 paintings and seven terracotta
patinated busts by Houdon.
And all depicted the men
that Jefferson admired,
many of them were American patriots,
and Jefferson understood their present
and future importance,
as did American artists.
His second picture was a
second portrait of Washington,
one of the battle of Princeton portraits
by Charles Wilson Peale.
The governor of Virginia had sent this
to Jefferson for Houdon,
and when it wasn't useful,
Jefferson displayed it.
Jefferson's collection of portraits
consisted of three groups.
The discoverers, Magellan, Cortes,
Columbus, Vespucci and Raleigh.
And he said our country
should not be without them.
And the, another group
were his triumvirate
of the three greatest men who ever lived,
Bacon, Newton and Locke.
And he also
obtained images of his
contemporaries, Franklin,
whom he considered the
greatest man of his age,
John Adams, Lafayette, John Paul Jones,
and Washington, also James Madison.
In October of 1787,
Jefferson got in touch with
Filippo Mazzei to obtain
copies of the Italians
who were instrumental
in discovering America.
And Jefferson had found
references to the portraits
in Visari's catalog of the
duchal collection in Florence.
So Jefferson asked Mazzei if
these works still existed,
and if he could find a
painter of good talents who,
being kept in obscurity
by untoward circumstances
worked cheap and work well.
Copies by such hands as these
might probably be obtained
at such prices as I would
be willing to give out.
So four months later,
Jefferson sent to Florence
for the portraits, and he was
gratified to receive them.
And they were installed
at his house in Paris.
25 years later, in
1814, Joseph Delaplaine,
a historian of sorts, turned
to Jefferson for his help
for his landmark publication,
The Repository of the Lives
and Portraits of Distinguished
American Characters.
Delaplaine went to considerable trouble
to provide correct and striking
likenesses for his book.
He asked Jefferson to lend the portraits,
but Jefferson declined.
He wrote Delaplaine that he,
quote, "Considered it as even
"Of some public concern
that our country should not
"Be without the portraits
of its first discoverers."
Too bad, Delaplaine.
He said that his copies
had already run the risk
of transportation from
Florence to Philadelphia
to Washington and lastly to this place,
where they are at length safely deposited.
But Jefferson generously
said that he would be happy
to receive as a guest any artist
whom you think proper to engage.
Jefferson wondered why
Mr. Peale did not think
of copying them while
they were in Philadelphia.
In fact, he continued.
So Jefferson's letter to
Delaplaine demonstrates
that Jefferson displayed
his American pantheon
in Philadelphia, Washington
and at Monticello,
where, he added dozens of
images to his collection
displayed throughout
Monticello's public rooms.
And in the tea room, he
had plasters of Houdon
we saw earlier in what he
called his most honorable suite.
Jefferson also displayed
America's natural wonders
and urged the artists Maria Cosway
and John Trumbull to paint them.
He told Cosway to paint,
quote, "The falling spring,
"The cascade of Niagara,
the passage of the Potomac
"Through the blue mountains,
the natural bridge.
"It is worth a voyage across the Atlantic
"To see these objects, much
more to paint and make them,
"And thereby ourselves known to all ages."
To Jefferson, these were
America's lasting monuments.
Rivaling the Parthenons and
pantheons of the ancient world.
In Philadelphia, Washington
and at Monticello,
Jefferson thus helped to forge
an American narrative
through these portraits,
historical renderings,
and natural wonders.
Regrettably, much of his collection,
most of his collection is lost.
Jefferson died in debt
and most of the paintings
were sold in two sales in Boston,
one in 1829 and the second in 1833.
And we have worked very
hard to find these paintings
with only limited, with some success.
In addition to collecting art,
Jefferson worked directly with painters
and artists such as John Trumbull.
Trumbull wrote that
Jefferson had kindly invited
me to come to Paris to
study the fine arts there,
and to make his house
my home during my stay.
With West's endorsement, Trumbull had
already committed himself to
a series of history paintings
commemorating the American Revolution
when he arrived in Paris
in 1786 with his paintings
of Bunker Hill and the Battle of Quebec
ready to be engraved.
Jefferson fortified the importance
of Trumbull's undertaking,
and Trumbull began
the Declaration of Independence
in Jefferson's house,
relying on Jefferson's description
of the place, of that room.
And it took Trumbull decades to take
the portraits for this iconic work.
Finally finished, he
engaged, Trumbull that is,
engaged Asher Durand
to engrave it in 1820.
And Jefferson was among the 275
subscribers who received it in 1823.
Trumbull also arranged for,
Jefferson also arranged
for Trumbull to take the
portraits of the 15 officers
in the Surrender of Lord
Cornwallis at Yorktown.
And Trumbull wrote, I
regard these as the best
of my portraits, they were painted
from life in Mr. Jefferson's house.
Trumbull gave Jefferson
one of his oil sketches,
now lost, as a present.
Like Benjamin West, Jefferson
hoped that Trumbull's
engravings of his revolutionary series
would be profitable and
popular, but they never were.
This was certainly
understood by Jefferson,
who was pleased by
Trumbull's big break in 1817,
a public commission for the murals
for the rotunda of the US Capitol.
President James Madison
chose him to present,
to paint the surrender of
the British army at Saratoga,
Yorktown, the resignation of
Washington and the Declaration.
This was the public art project
lambasted by John Adams.
Many American artists
shared Jefferson's views
about the importance of history painting.
In 1810, Charles Murray,
a member of the Society
of Artists of the United States,
stated that one of its
objectives was to, quote,
"Commemorate the American Revolution,
"And to place in the
conspicuous point of view
"Those patriots and
heroes who had the virtue
"And hardihood to assert and to secure
"The independence of their country."
Public buildings displaying
art, the US Capitol
and the Virginia state Capitol
were especially important
in an era largely without public museums.
Charles Wilson Peale, Jefferson's friend,
established his own
museum in Philadelphia.
Peale devoted himself to this effort,
writing, the first object of my life
is the enrichment of my museum.
Jefferson shared Peale's
interest not only in the museum,
but also in science, natural
history, technology and art.
Peale's self portrait,
The Artist in his Studio,
is analogous to Jefferson's self-fashioned
hall at Monticello, where
they each juxtaposed
natural history specimens, mastodon bones,
artworks, portraits, engravings, sculpture
and Native American artifacts.
And both places, Monticello
and Peale's museum,
were designed to educate
and influence public taste,
and thereby fostering American identity.
Peale wanted to establish
a national museum,
and asked then president
Jefferson to support it.
He declined, explaining
that such an enterprise
would not be allowed by the constitution.
But several years later,
Jefferson included a museum
in his proposed national university.
Museums, he wrote, kindle
a thirst for knowledge.
American artists embraced America's
natural wonders and landscapes.
While Jefferson could
not persuade Maria Cosway
to come to America to paint Niagara Falls,
John Vanderlyn, John
Trumbull, Edward Savage
and Thomas Cole were
harbingers of the enthusiasm
for the American landscape that was
to be realized by the Hudson River School.
Jefferson's prescient
efforts were, in his words,
the morsel of taste in our infancy,
promising much for our maturer age.
Jefferson's influence on the
arts was felt in other ways.
Jefferson's University of
Virginia, begun in 1819,
also influenced American
public architecture,
and today is regarded
as one of its monuments.
His iconic Virginia Capitol
also impacted artists
who placed the temple in
the American landscape.
That is Latrobe's drawing showing
the Virginia state Capitol in Richmond.
But this image became so
powerful that it became
an icon in its own, an
iconic expression on its own.
And you see here Strickland's
painting of a temple.
Jefferson's contributions were
recognized in his own time.
In 1811, he was unanimously
elected an honorary member
of the fledgling Society of
Artists of the United States,
an organization whose members
included Thomas Sully,
William Rush and Benjamin Henry Latrobe.
A year later, the Society of Artists
named Jefferson its president.
Jefferson saw the future of the arts
in America with optimism.
When architect Robert Mills told him about
the thriving society of artists,
he replied, the growing
wealth and population
of the United States
cannot fail to produce
an increasing demand for the
productions of the fine arts.
He lauded the prospect
of their permanence,
thus realizing his
objectives as an enthusiast
on the subject of the arts.
So, as architect, patron and advocate,
Jefferson assembled an
important early art collection
of European and American
art that he shared
in France and America,
piloted the form and function
of civic architecture,
created an architectural space
for an American pantheon
at the Virginia Capitol,
encouraged and mentored
American artists and architects,
used Monticello as a museum to educate,
supported the idea of a national museum,
and helped to create two
great Washington portraits.
Jefferson also improved national taste,
just as he had aspired to in 1785,
when he wrote, quote, "To
lay out the public money
"For something honorable,
the satisfaction of seeing
"An object and proof of
national good taste."
It was that Houdon sculpture
of Washington that Latrobe
referenced in his 1813 comment,
crediting Jefferson with
planting the arts in America.
He wrote, for the whole quotation,
the works already in
this city, Washington,
are the monuments of your judgment
and of your zeal, and your good taste.
The first sculpture that adorns
an American public building
perpetuates your protection
of the fine arts.
Had Latrobe written his comment in 1821,
he would have said the
first two sculptures
that adorn an American public building
perpetuates your protection
of the fine arts.
Jefferson deserves recognition for both
of these great works.
And I thank you, Xavier, for giving this
important work the
recognition it deserves.
Thank you for making it, bringing it
back to life for a new generation.
Thank you.
(audience applauds)
