
Public collection via the Art Institute of Chicago
AT-00001384Portrait of a Man
Inscriptions
Inscribed left: Benjamin West 179[...] (on the stick of sealing wax on the inkstand)
Provenance
Ehrich Galleries, New York, 1916; sold by to the Friends of American Art, Chicago, and presented to the Art Institute, 1916 [Day Book 7, p. 126, Registrar’s office]; transferred to the Byron L. Smith Collection, 1918 [Day Book 8, p. 145, Registrar’s office].
Exhibition history
Stockholm, Sweden, Kungl Akademien för de Fria Konsterna, Utställning av Amerikansk Konst i Stockholm [Exhibition of American Art in Stockholm], Mar. 15–Apr. 7, 1930, cat. 110, asPorträtt; Copenhagen, Denmark, Ny Carlsberg Glyptotek, Udstilling af Amerikanst Konst I København [Exhibition of American Art in Copenhagen], May 3–22, 1930; Munich, Germany, Ausstellung Americanischer Kunst [Exhibition of American Art], June–July, 1930 (organized by the American Scandinavian Foundation). Philadelphia, Pennsylvania Museum of Art, Benjamin West: 1738–1820, 1938, no. 42. Urbana, University of Illinois (Illini Union Building), on loan, 1941–51.
Publications
Art Institute of Chicago, Catalogue of Paintings, Drawings, Sculpture, and Architecture (Chicago, 1917), p. 153, no. 432. Frederic Fairchild Sherman, “The Art of Benjamin West,” Art in America 6 (April 1918), pp. 156, 157, ill. Ehrich Galleries, One Hundred Early American Paintings (New York, 1918), p. 154, ill. Friends of American Art, Sixth Year Book (Chicago, 1918), p. 27, ill. Art Institute of Chicago, Handbook of Sculpture, Architecture, Paintings, and Drawings (Chicago, 1920), p. 55, no. 557. Art Institute of Chicago, Handbook of Sculpture, Architecture and Paintings (Chicago, 1922), p. 59, no. 557. Art Institute of Chicago, Handbook of Sculpture, Architecture, and Paintings (Chicago, 1923), p. 59, no. 557. Art Institute of Chicago, A Guide to the Paintings in the Permanent Collection (Chicago, 1925), pp. 82, ill., 157, no. 557. Russell Walton Thorpe, “Benjamin West,” Antiquarian 7 (November 1926), p. 41, ill. Kungl Akademien för de Fria Konsterna, Utställning av Amerikansk Konst i Stockholm [Exhibition of American Art in Stockholm, exh. cat. (Kungl Akademien för de Fria Konsterna, 1930), 30, cat. 110 (ill.), asPorträtt. Art Institute of Chicago, A Guide to the Paintings in the Permanent Collection (Chicago, 1932), pp. 102, ill., 176. Art Institute of Chicago, Paintings in The Art Institute of Chicago: A Catalogue of the Picture Collection (Chicago, 1961), p. 481. Helmut von Erffa and Allen Staley, The Paintings of Benjamin West (New Haven and London, 1986), pp. 575–76, no. 734, ill. Malcolm Warner in Susan Wise and Malcolm Warner, French and British Paintings from 1600 to 1800 in The Art Institute of Chicago. A Catalogue of the Collection (Chicago, 1996), pp. 296–8, ill.
Data retrieved from the Art Institute of Chicago on October 8, 2026. The museum may have updated its record since.
Quick Overview
- Artist
- Benjamin West (American, active England, 1738-1820)
- Date
- 1790–99
- Medium
- Oil on canvas
- Dimensions
- 127 × 102 cm (50 × 40 1/8 in.); Framed: 152.4 × 128.3 × 11.5 cm (60 × 50 1/2 × 4 1/2 in.)
- Type
- Painting
- Classification
- oil on canvas
- Style
- 18th Century
- Place
- England
- Department
- Painting and Sculpture of Europe
- Credit line
- Gift of the Family of Byron L. Smith
- Accession no.
- 1916.209
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