Sully, Thomas. Portrait of Shakespeare

Folger bibliographic ID: 128712
Pressly, W.L. Paintings in the Folger Shakespeare Library: 170 (Plate 26)
Folger call number: FPa79
Folger holdings ID: 230218
Accession Number: cs1398

General notes

The lining of the canvas is annotated in black ink on its back: "Shakespeare / Copied from Engravings / TS 1864." Presumably this annotation repeats information on the back of the original canvas Also available as a digital reproduction Bought by Folger from Charles Sessler, Importer and Bookseller, 1314 Walnut St., Philadelphia, December 1924, $1500 Provenance: By descent to Dr. Matthew Woods, whose family purchased the painting for $3000; sold at auction in Philadelphia for $1100; bought by Sessler $1300 (above information from Sessler correspondence in Folger file) Title from Pressly

Publications

Matthew Woods, Rambles of a Physician: or, A Midsummer Dream, Philadelphia, 1889, vol. 1, p. 218, repr. on p. 219 with the following caption: "SULLY'S 'THREE THOUSAND DOLLAR SHAKESPEARE' IN POSSESSION OF THE AUTHOR), PAINTED BY THAT ARTIST FROM HIS COLLECTION OF NEARLY 400 PICTURES OF SHAKESPEARE, AND WHICH HE MAINTAINED 'CONTAINED THE EXCELLENCIES OF ALL, AND THE FAULTS OF NONE'"; Biddle and Fielding 1921, no. 1570

Exhibited

Exhibited: 'As imagination bodies forth...' [paintings] Oct. 28, 1993-Feb. 15, 1994 Washington, D.C., Folger Shakespeare Library, 2014. Shakespeare's the Thing Washington, DC, Folger Shakespeare Library, May 2017- February 2018. Painting Shakespeare

Extended title: Portrait of Shakespeare TS 1864

artist: Sully, Thomas, 1783-1872
former owner: Woods, Matthew, Dr.
former owner: Sessler, Charles, 1854-1935