| Contributor |
Peale, Raphaelle, 1774-1825, artist. |
|
Williams, Moses, 1777-1825, artist. |
| Title |
Moses Williams, cutter of profiles [graphic]. |
| Publisher |
[Philadelphia] |
| Publisher |
PA. Philadelphia. 1803 |
| Date |
[ca. 1803] |
| Physical Description |
1 item : silhouette ; sheet 9 x 8 cm (3.5 x 3.25 in.) |
| Description |
Silhouette of Peale's Museum premier African American silhouettist, facing left. Williams wears his hair in a ponytail adorned
with a bow at the end. A bow adorns his collar as well. Williams was enslaved by Charles Willson Peale following the manumission
of his parents in 1786. After his manumission in 1804, Williams began work as a silhouettist in Peale's Museum.
|
| Notes |
Possibly by Moses Williams or possibly Raphaelle Peale. |
|
Title from manuscript note on recto. |
|
Manuscript note on verso: Moses Williams, the Cutter of Profiles. Peales Museum. |
|
Part of digital collections catalog through a grant from the Institute of Museum and Library Services as administered by the
Pennsylvania Department of Education through the Office of Commonwealth Libraries, and the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, Tom
Corbett, Governor, 2013-2014.
|
|
See Gwendolyn DuBois Shaw, " 'Moses Williams, Cutter of Profiles': Silhouettes and African American Identity in the Early
Republic," Proceedings of the American Philosophical Society 49 (March 2005), particularly p. 36.
|
|
See Gwendolyn DuBois Shaw, "'Moses Williams, Cutter of Profiles,' Silhouettes and African American Identity in the Early Republic,"
in Portraits of a People. Picturing African Americans in the Nineteenth Century (Seattle & London: Addison Gallery of American
Art in association with the University of Washington Press, 2006 ), pp. 45-55, 69.
|
|
Originally part of a McAllister scrapbook of portraits. |
|
McAllister Collection, gift, 1886. |
|
Description revised 2021. |
|
Access points revised 2021. |
| Subject |
Williams, Moses, 1777-approximately 1825, -- Portraits. |
|
Artists -- Pennsylvania -- Philadelphia. |
|
Free African Americans -- Pennsylvania -- Philadelphia. |
|
Freedmen -- Pennsylvania -- Philadelphia. |
|
Free African American men -- Pennsylvania -- Philadelphia. |
|
Free men -- 1783-1815 -- Pennsylvania -- Philadelphia. |
| Genre |
Portrait prints -- 1800-1810. |
|
Silhouettes -- 1800-1810. |
| Location |
Library Company of Philadelphia| Print Department| Silhouette Collection [(3)5750.F.153b] |
| Accession number |
(3)5750.F.153b |
