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COPLEY AND HIS WORK
American Art First becomes of Serious Importance with Copley and West. — Copley's Family. — His Stepfather, Peter Pelham. — Copley's Early Training. — His Marriage and Life in Boston. — Exhibits in London.— Finally goes abroad and is followed by
his Family. — Settles in London.— Works painted there.— His Death. —His Personal Character. — His Painting. — Sincerity of his Work done in America. — Improvement of his Workmanship in England
In spite of the modest merits of their predecessors, it
was with Copley and West that American painters first took a recognized position in the world of art. Neither
of the men were geniuses, but they had respectable talents; and both for what they did and for what they
were, each occupies securely a little niche in the temple of Fame which shields him against
oblivion.
With no similarity of character or of work, there is still a curious parallelism in their
lives — each born in different provinces of a new country where art was still in its infancy, and each coming
to London to gain wealth, honor, fame, and finally to die there at an advanced age, just as their vogue was
beginning seriously to decline. They were almost exactly contemporaries, having been born and dying within a
year or so of each other.
Copley was the elder, which of itself should give him precedence; but it is also convenient
to consider him first because his beginnings are interwoven with the earlier men, and his work shows their
style, which he carried on and perfected, being brought up and working at Boston, which was, as much as any
place could be, the centre of the intellectual life of the colonies. He did not go to England until he was
nearly forty, and led there a rather retired and quiet life, in pointed contrast to West, who had scarcely
any professional instruction in America, and was hardly of age when he left, but who advised, taught, and
assisted two generations of younger men in their beginnings.
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