Attack on Bunker's Hill, with the Burning of Charles Town

1783 or after

We look across and down at a channel of water separating two landmasses labeled "Boston" and "Charles Town" in this horizontal landscape painting. Four three-masted ships are in the aquamarine-blue harbor between us and the land. Three of them have their sails unfurled and smoke billows from the broad, starboard side of each. Tidy rows of brown houses line the area of Boston. A puff of white smoke rises from the farthest point. Two arrow-shaped missiles, perhaps projectiles on fire, arc toward Charles Town, where billowing gray plumes of smoke rise from vivid orange fire on the far side of the landmass. Rowboats bring soldiers to the shore of Charles Town, close to where hundreds of soldiers line up and fire at each other. Much of the rest of Charles Town is a hill leading to sheer cliffs to our right. Tan and gray-colored smoke mixes among bright white clouds against a pale blue sky on the top half of the painting.

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Artwork overview

Artwork history & notes

Provenance

Recorded as from New York. (Harry Stone Gallery, New York, by 1943),[1] by whom sold in 1949 to Edgar William and Bernice Chrysler Garbisch; gift to NGA, 1953.
[1] In this year Stone lent the painting to exhibitions at the Lyman Allyn Museum in New London, Connecticut, and the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston.

Associated Names

Exhibition History

1943

  • Navy Show, Lyman Allyn Museum, New London, Connecticut, 1943, no cat.

  • Boston, 1630-1872, Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, 1943, no cat.

1944

  • American Battle Painting, 1776-1918, National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.; Museum of Modern Art, New York, 1944, 54, pl. 3.

1965

  • Trois millenaires d'art et de marine, Petit Palais du Louvre, 1965, 401, no. 281.

1967

  • National Gallery Loan Exhibition, Mint Museum of Art, Charlotte, North Carolina, 1967, no. 6.

1972

  • Extended loan for use by Caspar Weinberger, Director of the Budget and Secretary of Health, Education and Welfare, Washington, D.C., 1972-1975.

1978

  • The American Folk Art Tradition: Paintings from the Garbisch Collection, National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C., 1978.

1981

  • Amerian Naive Paintings from the National Gallery of Art, Terra Museum of American Art, Evanston, Illinois, 1981-1982, no. 36 (cat. by Ronald McKnight Melvin).

1982

  • Extended loan for use by The White House, Washington, D.C., 1982-1985.

1986

  • Extended loan for use by the White House Preservation Office in the ceremonial office of the Vice President, Old Executive Office Building, Washington, D.C., 1986-1997.

1997

  • Extended loan for display in the ceremonial office of Vice President Albert Gore, Jr., Old Executive Office Building, Washington, D.C., 1997-2001.

2001

  • Extended loan for display in the ceremonial office of Vice President Richard B. Cheney, Dwight D. Eisenhower Executive Office Building (formerly Old Executive Office Building), Washington, D.C., 2001-2007; 2008-2009.

2012

  • Extended loan for display in the ceremonial office of the Vice President, Dwight D. Eisenhower Executive Office Building, Washington, D.C., 2012-

Bibliography

1942

  • Drepperd, Carl W. American Pioneer Arts and Artists. Springfield, Massachusetts, 1942: 87.

1968

  • Coit, Margaret L. "Dearest Friends." American Heritage 19 (October 1968): 10-11, color repro.

1970

  • American Paintings and Sculpture: An Illustrated Catalogue. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1970: 126, repro.

1980

  • American Paintings: An Illustrated Catalogue. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1980: 264, repro.

1992

  • Chotner, Deborah, with contributions by Julie Aronson, Sarah D. Cash, and Laurie Weitzenkorn. American Naive Paintings. The Collections of the National Gallery of Art Systematic Catalogue. Washington, D.C., 1992: 410-412, color repro. 411.

  • American Paintings: An Illustrated Catalogue. National Gallery of Art, Washington, 1992: 388, repro.

Inscriptions

center left: BOSTON; upper right: CHARLES TOWN

Wikidata ID

Q20179171

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