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Stuart endows his subject with character and elegance through sheer technical facility, which is evident in Walker's exquisitely rendered flesh tones and lifelike eyes.

This portrait was painted on the occasion of the sitter's marriage.

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Gilbert Stuart

Marianne Ashley Walker. 1799

oil on canvas

30 ½ x 25 ½ in.

Gift of Mrs. Nicholas H. Noyes

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Debt resulting from an inability to manage money kept Gilbert Stuart on the move much of his life.  Born in North Kingston, Rhode Island and raised in Newport, Stuart was taught by a local Scottish painter who took him to Scotland, but his mentor’s death forced Stuart back to America.  During the Revolutionary War, he returned to England to study with the American expatriate Benjamin West.  As success came, so did debt which forced Stuart to Dublin, Ireland and then to America, where he eventually became the most highly regarding portraitist of his day. A skillful master of his craft, Stuart painted directly on the canvas, without using any preliminary drawing. By the end of his career, Stuart had painted over a thousand portraits of important political figures.  One of his most famous portraits of George Washington was the “Athenaeum Head” currently on the dollar bill.

The portrait of Marianne Ashley Walker exemplifies Stuart’s ability to endow his sitters with character and elegance through sheer technical facility.  The velvet-draped column and serene pose are standard conventions’ of Romantic portraiture, but Stuart’s particular gifts shine forth from her exquisitely rendered flesh tones and lifelike eyes.  Stuart has seized upon the young woman’s dignified beauty, drawing her poise and confidence to an expressive point that stops short of arrogance or disdain.  Marianne Ashley Walker was the daughter of John Ashley of Philadelphia. In 1799 she married Simon Walker in Philadelphia.  The portrait is thought to have been painted on the occasion of her wedding. The companion portrait of her husband is in the Baltimore Museum.

Reference

Carrie Rebora Barratt, Ellen Gross Miles.  Gilbert Stuart, New York: Metropolitan Museum of Art, 2004.  ISBN-13: 978-1588391247