D. D. Egbert, \"A bust of washington owned by Jefferson\", Record of the Museum of Historic Art, Princeton University 6, no. 1/2 (1947): p. 3-5.
","citation":"D. D. Egbert, \"A bust of washington owned by Jefferson\", Record of the Museum of Historic Art, Princeton University 6, no. 1/2 (1947): p. 3-5.
, p. 3-5","date":1947,"id":3609,"uri":"https://www.jstor.org/stable/3774164"},{"boilertext":"Princeton University Art Museum: Handbook of the Collections (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Art Museum, 2013)","citation":"Princeton University Art Museum: Handbook of the Collections (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Art Museum, 2013), p. 234","date":2013,"id":1994,"uri":"https://search.worldcat.org/title/865020505"},{"boilertext":"Allen Rosenbaum and Francis F. Jones, Selections from The Art Museum, Princeton University, (Princeton, NJ: The Art Museum, Princeton University, 1986)","citation":"Allen Rosenbaum and Francis F. Jones, Selections from The Art Museum, Princeton University, (Princeton, NJ: The Art Museum, Princeton University, 1986), p. 270 (illus.)","date":1986,"id":1899,"uri":"https://search.worldcat.org/title/14244748"},{"boilertext":"Princeton University Art Museum: Handbook of the Collection (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2007)","citation":"Princeton University Art Museum: Handbook of the Collection (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2007), 224 (illus.)","date":2007,"id":474,"uri":"https://search.worldcat.org/title/191864564"}],"nowebuse":"False","periods":[],"department":"American Art","attribute_groups":[{"id":2199325,"term":"North American Art","termtype":"Collecting Area"}],"daterange":"A.D. 1800-1850","dateend":1822,"depicted":[{"id":1755,"displayname":"George Washington","displaydate":"1732–1799; born Westmoreland County, VA; died Mount Vernon, VA","datebegin":1732,"dateend":1799,"prefix":"Person depicted:","suffix":null,"role":"Depicted","displaymaker":"Person depicted: George Washington, 1732–1799; born Westmoreland County, VA; died Mount Vernon, VA","displayorder":2}],"titles":[{"title":"George Washington","titletype":"Primary Title","displayorder":1}],"hasimage":"true","creditlinerepro":"","objectnumber":"y1946-78","inscribed":null,"texts":[{"texttype":"Online","textpurpose":"Gallery Label","textentryhtml":"Peale’s iconic George Washington at the Battle of Princeton monumentalizes an event central to both Princeton’s and the nation’s history. On January 3, 1777, following the famous crossing of the Delaware River and a decisive win at Trenton, the Continental Army under General Washington consolidated its momentum with a second victory on and around the Princeton University campus, visible in the background of Peale’s composition. Washington’s legendary heroism that day and throughout the Revolution promoted the cult of personality that developed around America’s “Founding Father.” The two sculptures flanking the portrait complicate this legacy, and that of American history more generally. Rush’s bust of Washington was once owned by another president, Thomas Jefferson, like Washington a major enslaver, with a particularly troubling relationship to slavery owing to his intimate relations with a woman he enslaved. The contemporary Mohawk artist Alan Michelson created the bust installed opposite. His work references Washington’s role as Hanödaga:yas, “Town Destroyer” in the Seneca language, who in 1779 ordered the “total destruction and devastation” of Native American settlements. Its polished, mirrored surface reflects viewers back to themselves, undercutting the mythical heroism earlier American artists projected onto Washington, and metaphorically asking, in the artist’s words, “Do you see yourself reflected in this American icon?”\n","remarks":"AMER-STR2_23-27_WLA_01_FA01 Day 1 Cataloguing - Group chat for y1946-78, PP222, and 2025-20"},{"texttype":"Online","textpurpose":"Special Exhibition","textentryhtml":"William Rush, America’s first major sculptor, knew George Washington personally and claimed to have sketched him from life to create this work. Portraits of Washington were in great demand, but, seeking to distance himself from the self-promotion typically associated with monarchs, the first president was notoriously unwilling to pose for artists. Works that were based on sittings thus gained a particularly authoritative voice in characterizing the man—and, by extension, the nascent American republic. Rush cast this bust in plaster after a terracotta original, creating multiple copies to meet popular demand. Likely the only surviving replica directly produced by the artist, it is believed to have belonged to Thomas Jefferson and thus is evidence of the close network of relationships among early American influencers. It is to the tradition of portraits such as this example that Titus Kaphar, whose work is on view nearby, responds.","remarks":"Making History Visible"},{"texttype":"Online","textpurpose":"Provenance","textentryhtml":"Probably Thomas Jefferson (1743-1826); [probably sale of Thomas Jefferson’s Poplar Forest estate, January 1, 1826]; probably purchased at the above sale by Alexander Gaddess Sr. (d. ca. 1850), Lynchburg (VA); by inheritance to his son John B. Gaddess (1831-1877), who kept it at the office of the marble yard he established in Lynchburg (VA) in 1840; purchased with John B. Gaddess’s business by John I. Van Ness, 1877; purchased by Clarence Loving, Covesville (VA); purchased by Mrs. Dora Lee Curtis (1874-1960), Arlington (VA), 1924; purchased by the Princeton University Art Museum, 1946 [1].\n\n[1] This provenance record is based on Donald Drew Egbert, “A bust of Washington owned by Jefferson”, i","remarks":null}],"datebegin":1812,"sortnumber":"1946 78y","published_date":"2026-02-11 09:53:55.222039","objectid":23197,"dimensions":"69.8 × 57.1 × 36.5 cm (27 1/2 × 22 1/2 × 14 3/8 in.)","on_view":true}