A Portrait of Washington
Charles Balthazar Julien
Fevret de Saint-Mémin (1770-1852)
George Washington
Black and white chalk on paper, ca. 1800
Prints & Photographs Division
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One of the most meticulous and elegant portraitists in America
during the Federal period, Charles St. Memin employed modern theories
and classical taste to create this unique memorial image of the
nation's first president. The profile format was inspired both by
contemporary writings on physiognomy, which held that cranial structure
revealed moral character and intellectual capabilities, and by recent
excavations of Greek antiquities, which showed that profiles were
preferred by that early democratic model for the new American republic.
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