Author: Robert Brenner File Type: pdf

Author: Jane Kamensky File Type: epub This bold new history recovers an unknown American Revolution as seen through the eyes of Boston-born painter John Singleton Copley.Boston in the 1740s a bustling port at the edge of the British empire. A boy comes of age in a small wooden house along the Long Wharf, which juts into the harbor, as though reaching for London thousands of miles across the ocean. Sometime in his childhood, he learns to draw.That boy was John Singleton Copley, who became, by the 1760s, colonial Americas premier painter. His brush captured the faces of his neighborsordinary men like Paul Revere, John Hancock, and Samuel Adamswho would become the revolutionary heroes of a new United States. Today, in museums across America, Copleys brilliant portraits evoke patriotic fervor and rebellious optimism.The artist, however, did not share his subjects politics. Copleys nation was Britain his capital, London. When rebellion sundered Britains empire, both kin and calling determined the painters allegiances. He sought the largest canvas for his talents and the safest home for his family. So, by the time the United States declared its independence, Copley and his kin were in London. He painted Americas revolution from a far shore, as Britains American War.An intimate portrait of the artist and his extraordinary times, Jane Kamenskys A Revolution in Color masterfully reveals the world of the American Revolution, a place in time riven by divided loyalties and tangled sympathies. Much like the world in which he lived, Copleys life and career were marked by spectacular rises and devastating falls. But though his ambivalence cost him dearly, the painters achievements in both Britain and America made him a towering figure of both nations artistic legacies.**ReviewFar from a born partisan, Copley could have gone either way. Kamenskys great accomplishment is to leave readers pulled by different audiences, demands, and political allegiances right along with him. - Caitlin Fitz, *The Atlantic* A memorable journey into the transatlantic world in the age of revolution through a close study of the greatest colonial American artist. Kamensky, a historian with an art historians sensibility, provides a brilliant survey of John Singleton Copleys life, work, and subjects, vivified by a detailed examination of letters, diaries, and official records, many previously untapped, to involve the reader in the emotional and sensory experience of living in those tumultuous times. - Jules Prown, Yale University Vivid, intimate, and richly detailed, Jane Kamenskys biography of John Singleton Copley illuminates the deeply intertwined worlds of America and England at the moment of their violent divorce. The career of the great painter from Boston provides a wonderfully fresh and surprising perspective on the American Revolution, on the scope of artistic ambition, and on the high costs of divided loyalty. - Stephen Greenblatt, author of *The Swerve* Jane Kamensky has not only crafted a stunning biography but also a truly singular account of the American Revolution. A Revolution in Color masterfully unravels any easy distinctions between patriots and loyalists. - Amanda Foreman, author of *The World Made by Women* The greatest American artist of the eighteenth century, John Singleton Copley, preferred life in Britain, escaping from the bitter civil war that we call the American Revolution. In this brilliantly insightful and lucidly written biography, Jane Kamensky reveals the age of revolution in fresh new tones as complex and compelling as the interplay of light and shade in the finest Copley painting. - Alan Taylor, author of *American Revolutions* A pleasure to read from first page to last, Jane Kamenskys exploration of the life, work and tumultuous times of John Singleton Copley is itself a masterpiece. Like all excellent portraitists, Kamensky probes deeply into the character of her subject, as deft with the small, revealing detail as she is with the sweeping strokes of landscape and setting. Both gripping narrative history and insightful art criticism, A Revolution in Color is a genre-busting tour de force. - Geraldine Brooks, author of *The Secret Chord* Beautifully written and elegant, A Revolution in Color gives us a vibrant and new perspective on the conflict between America and Great Britain, a conflict the ambitious John Singleton Copley embodied. Jane Kamensky enriches our understanding of this vital time in world history. - Annette Gordon-Reed, author of *Most Blessed of the Patriarchs* Richly resourced, prismatic, dynamic, factually and psychologically revelatory, and ebulliently spiked with political insights and ironies, Kamenskys biography provides an intimate view of the American Revolution and its immediate aftermath as seen through the acute, penetrating gaze of a masterful artist. - Donna Seaman, *Booklist (starred)* There may never be a better biography of Copley than this sumptuous, exquisitely told story of a man and his time. - Kirkus Reviews (starred)About the Author Jane Kamensky is a professor of history at Harvard University and the faculty director of the Schlesinger Library on the History of Women in America at the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study. Her many books include The Exchange Artist, a finalist for the George Washington Book Prize.