Raphaelle Peale (February 17, 1774 – March 4, 1825) is considered the first professional American painter of still-life.

Biography

Peale was born in Annapolis, Maryland

Annapolis, Maryland

Annapolis is the capital of the U.S. state of Maryland, as well as the county seat of Anne Arundel County. It had a population of 38,394 at the 2010 census and is situated on the Chesapeake Bay at the mouth of the Severn River, south of Baltimore and about east of Washington, D.C. Annapolis is...

, the fifth child, though eldest surviving, of the painter Charles Willson Peale

Charles Willson Peale

Charles Willson Peale was an American painter, soldier and naturalist. He is best remembered for his portrait paintings of leading figures of the American Revolution, as well as establishing one of the first museums....

 and his first wife Rachel Brewer. He grew up in Philadelphia, and spent his life there in a home at the corner of 3rd and Lombard. Like his siblings (all of whom were named after famous artists or scientists), Raphaelle was trained by his father as an artist. Early in his career, the pair collaborated on portraits. On some commissions, Raphaelle painted miniatures while his brother, Rembrandt

Rembrandt Peale

Rembrandt Peale was an American artist and museum keeper. A prolific portrait painter, he was especially acclaimed for his likenesses of presidents George Washington and Thomas Jefferson...

, painted full-size portraits.

In 1793, he made a trip to South America in order to collect specimens for the Peale Museum

Peale Museum

The Peale Museum, also known as the Municipal Museum of Baltimore, was a museum of paintings and natural history, located in Baltimore, Maryland, USA. It occupied the first building in the Western Hemisphere to be designed and built as a museum. The Peale Museum was created by Charles Willson Peale...

 founded by his father. His first professional exhibition was in 1795 at the age of 21. In 1797, with his brother Rembrandt, he traveled to Charleston, South Carolina

Charleston, South Carolina

Charleston is the second largest city in the U.S. state of South Carolina. It was made the county seat of Charleston County in 1901 when Charleston County was founded. The city's original name was Charles Towne in 1670, and it moved to its present location from a location on the west bank of the...

, where they attempted to establish another museum. The plan fell through, however, and Raphaelle returned to painting miniatures.

He married Martha (Patty) McGlathery at the age of twenty, and with her had eight children. For about two years beginning in 1803, Peale toured Virginia with the "physiognotrace", a profile making machine, with which he was briefly successful. By 1806 he had begun to suffer the symptoms of arsenic

Arsenic

Arsenic is a chemical element with the symbol As, atomic number 33 and relative atomic mass 74.92. Arsenic occurs in many minerals, usually in conjunction with sulfur and metals, and also as a pure elemental crystal. It was first documented by Albertus Magnus in 1250.Arsenic is a metalloid...

 and mercury

Mercury (element)

Mercury is a chemical element with the symbol Hg and atomic number 80. It is also known as quicksilver or hydrargyrum...

 poisoning brought on by his work as a taxidermist

Taxidermy

Taxidermy is the act of mounting or reproducing dead animals for display or for other sources of study. Taxidermy can be done on all vertebrate species of animals, including mammals, birds, fish, reptiles, and amphibians...

 in his father's museum. In August 1809 he was hospitalized with delirium, and for the rest of his life he suffered debilitating attacks almost yearly—which his father ascribed to "gout

Gout

Gout is a medical condition usually characterized by recurrent attacks of acute inflammatory arthritis—a red, tender, hot, swollen joint. The metatarsal-phalangeal joint at the base of the big toe is the most commonly affected . However, it may also present as tophi, kidney stones, or urate...

 of the stomach" caused by consumption of pickles and excessive drinking. By 1813, he was unable to walk without crutches. After the downturn in his health, in an era when most artists considered still life

Still life

A still life is a work of art depicting mostly inanimate subject matter, typically commonplace objects which may be either natural or man-made...

 a subject worthy only of amateurs, he devoted himself almost exclusively to still life painting. It is for these works he is best known. His work was on frequent exhibit at the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts

Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts

The Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts is a museum and art school in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. It was founded in 1805 and is the oldest art museum and school in the United States. The academy's museum is internationally known for its collections of 19th and 20th century American paintings,...

 between 1814 and 1818. After reportedly indulging in a night of heavy drinking, his health destroyed, he died on March 4, 1825 at age 51 at his home in Philadelphia.

Style

Alfred Frankenstein

Alfred Frankenstein

Alfred Victor Frankenstein was an art and music critic, author and professional musician.He was the long-time art and music critic for the San Francisco Chronicle...

 has called Raphaelle Peale "the first really distinguished still-life specialist to emerge in this country, and he is one of the four major still-life painters of the nineteenth century in the United States." His style may have been influenced by Spanish still life paintings he saw on his trip to Mexico and by the two works by Juan Sanchez Cotan

Juan Sánchez Cotán

Juan Sánchez Cotán was a Spanish Baroque painter, a pioneer of realism in Spain. His still lifes, also called bodegones were painted in a strikingly austere style, especially when compared to similar works in Netherlands and Italy.- Life:Sánchez Cotán was born in the town of Orgaz, near Toledo, Spain...

, exhibited at the Pennsylvania Academy in 1816. Most of Peale's paintings are small in scale, and depict a few objects—usually foodstuffs—arranged on a tabletop before a darkened background. A notable exception is his trompe l'oeil

Trompe l'oeil

Trompe-l'œil, which can also be spelled without the hyphen in English as trompe l'oeil, is an art technique involving extremely realistic imagery in order to create the optical illusion that the depicted objects appear in three dimensions.-History in painting:Although the phrase has its origin in...

, Venus Rising from the Sea—A Deception (also entitled After the Bath; 1822).

Major works

• Blackberries, circa 1813
• Melons and Morning Glories, 1813
• A Dessert (Still Life with Lemons and Oranges), 1814
• Still Life with Orange and Book, 1815
• Fruit, Pitcher, and Pretzel, unknown
• Bowl of Peaches, 1816
• Still Life with Fruit, Cakes and Wine, 1821
• Still Life with Cake, 1822
• Still Life with Peaches, 1822
• Lemons and Sugar, unknown

External links

• Raphaelle Peale at Artcyclopedia.com
• "Raphaelle Peale (1774 - 1825) Artwork Images, Exhibitions, Reviews" (list of works), World Wide Arts Resources, 2007, webpage: WWAR-RPeale.
• "The Metropolitan Museum of Art - Works of Art: American Paintings" (history), Metropolitan Museum of Art, 2007, webpage: MMA-RPeale.
• The Birmingham Museum of Art A Portrait of Margaret George McGlathery 1817https://www.artsbma.org/collectionitemdetails?searchartistname=Raphaelle&showform=0&ordering=popular&searchphrase=any&areas%5B%5D0%20=portfolio&areas%5B%5D=portfolio&searchlayout=details&limit=1&start=0