Arthur Ross Gallery to launch America 250 exhibition this fall
‘At Liberty: Life in the City of Brotherly Love During the Early Republic’ will be on view Aug. 28 through Dec. 13. The fall exhibition, located in the Arthur Ross Gallery, will consider the role of visual culture and perceptions of Philadelphia during the era of the Revolution.
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Attributed to John Lewis Krimmel (1786–1821), “Nightlife in Philadelphia—an Oyster Barrow in front of the Chestnut Street Theater” (1811–ca. 1813). Formerly attributed to Pavel Petrovich Svinin (1787/88–1839). Watercolor and Graphite on white laid paper. Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York City.
On view Aug. 28 through Dec. 13, the exhibition is curated by Gwendolyn DuBois Shaw, inaugural faculty director of the Arthur Ross Gallery, and the James and Nan Farquhar Professor of the History of Art in Penn’s School of Arts & Sciences.
“In addition to historical pictures and objects from the 18th and 19th centuries, the exhibition will also include images of the era made to celebrate important national anniversaries, such as the marking of America’s 150th in 1926, through to the present moment, inviting exploration,” Shaw says. “I would like visitors to ask themselves, how does our distance from Old Philadelphia change how we imagine it? And how might AI impact the ways our descendants come to know that past?”
The artworks include a recently restored portrait of British abolitionist Samuel Romilly by artist Gilbert Stuart that hung for many years in Penn’s Houston Hall. Two rarely seen works by the American-born, English-trained painter Benjamin West given to Pennsylvania Hospital in the 18th century also have received special conservation work to prepare them for exhibition. A suite of drawings by the German-born painter John Lewis Krimmel depicting typical street scenes from around 1813 complements selected plates from William Birch’s “Views of Philadelphia,” published a decade earlier. Several portraits of Benjamin Franklin, painted by artists like Charles Willson Peale who were active in the era of the Revolution, complete the exhibition.
The exhibition’s opening celebration will be from 5-7 p.m. on Wednesday, Sept. 9, in the Gallery.
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