JOHN TRUMBULL (1756-1843)
John Trumbull is best known for his historical mural paintings in the rotunda of the nation’s capitol building in Washington D.C. Inspired by his teacher, Benjamin West, Trumbull was not only a successful artist but also a leading figure in the field of art education, as president of the New York Academy of the Fine Arts.
Born July 6, 1756 in Lebanon, Connecticut, John Trumbull was the second son of Jonathan Trumbull and Faith Robinson Trumbull. His father served as governor of the Connecticut Colony, from 1769 to 1784, before and during the Revolutionary War. While he was still young, John Trumbull's artistic talent became evident. He was fifteen when he visited John Singleton Copley's home in Boston and decided to become an artist. His parents, who wanted him to follow a more secure profession, did not encourage his interest in art. He attended Harvard University and graduated in 1773 at the age of seventeen, the youngest in his class.
After graduation, Trumbull taught school in Lebanon. Following the outbreak of the Revolutionary War, he joined the Continental Army. He served in a position of second personal aide to General George Washington, and during the next two years, while in the army, in June of 1776, Trumbull rose to deputy adjutant-general with the rank of colonel under General Horatio Gates with whom he went to Ticonderoga and later to Pennsylvania.
During that period Trumbull displayed his artistic talent with a self-portrait produced in 1777. Shown in a three-quarter view from the waist up against a dark background, Trumbull wears a brown suit with white shirt, the ruffled collar showing at the front opening of his jacket. His face is turned toward the viewer with a slight smile. A quite handsome young man of approximately twenty-one years of age, his pallet with two brushes rests on a bound book that lies on the wooden surface of the table at his side.
While serving under General Benedict Arnold, Trumbull wintered in Providence, Rhode Island. In the summer of 1778, he volunteered to be Aide-de-Camp to General John Sullivan. His rank was that of colonel when he resigned his commission. With the intention of pursuing a career as an artist, Trumbull went to Boston, where he was soon producing portraits in the provincial manner of the time. He had been inspired by Copley's polished technique, and worked to achieve a similar style.
Trumbull sailed for London in 1780 to study with Benjamin West. Despite the fact that England and America were at war, John Trumbull had received assurance from the British authorities in Boston that he would be allowed to enter England for the purpose of studying art in West’s studio. Unfortunately, Trumbull arrived at the worst possible time. News had reached London of the arrest and execution of British Major John Andre in America for conspiring with Benedict Arnold to hand West Point over to the British.
In London, Trumbull was seized and imprisoned in Tothill Fields Bridewell. It was a known fact that Trumbull, son of the governor of the Connecticut Colony, had served in the Continental Army as a colonel. Benjamin West obtained the King's pledge of safety for Trumbull. As a result, Trumbull was treated well and allowed to paint in his cell. After serving seven months as a political prisoner, Trumbull was released on the condition that he leave England. He crossed from the British Isles to the Continent and spent the remainder of the war traveling in other countries.
When he was allowed to return to London in 1784, Trumbull joined the group of art students who were taught by Benjamin West. There, he studied with other American artists who had traveled to England to pursue their art training in West's studio. Under the influence of West's enthusiasm for history painting, Trumbull decided to do a series of paintings based on the recent war. West suggested that Trumbull limit the size of his paintings to two feet by three feet. He felt that Trumbull's damaged eyesight might cause him to distort a larger picture. Trumbull was almost blind in one eye due to a childhood accident, and his depth perception was thereby limited.
There is an anecdote related by William Dunlap in his book, The History of the Rise and Progress of the Arts of Design in the United States, concerning the time Trumbull and Gilbert Stuart were both students in West's studio. Stuart was West’s assistant, and Trumbull frequently submitted work he was developing to Stuart for constructive criticism. Stuart was puzzled by a drawing Trumbull had shown him, and made a comment to the effect that it looked as though a one-eyed person had drawn it. Trumbull took offence since he indeed had one blind eye. Stuart claimed that he hadn’t any idea that Turnbull could only see out of one eye. Stuart had the reputation of being a great storyteller. Whether or not the anecdote is true, it indicates that there may have been some obvious distortion in Trumbull's early drawings, although his paintings of that period don't indicate that such was the case.
When Trumbull began his series of historical paintings based on the Revolutionary War, he felt he was well qualified to depict such scenes having been personally involved in the war. Thomas Jefferson, while serving as American Ambassador to France, asked Trumbull to become his private secretary. In a letter to Jefferson declining the offer, Trumbull explained that he wanted to devote his time to painting scenes that depict the war and some of the individuals involved in it. Trumbull believed that he was in a unique position to document the Revolutionary War, having taken part in it as an American soldier.
Although the paintings in the original series were approximately two by three feet, the small scale did not prevent Trumbull from depicting large-scale events. The first painting he completed was The Death of General Warren at the Battle of Bunker Hill, 1786, a dramatic depiction of the war scene. The focus of the action is in the foreground left of center where two members of the Revolutionary forces, wearing white shirts, defend their fallen leader Major General Joseph Warren, who is stretched out on the ground. Warren is held by the strong right arm of a kneeling soldier who cradles the fallen leader’s upper body. The same soldier, with his extended left arm, repulses the thrust of an enemy soldier’s bayonet directed toward Warren’s body. Lying limp, with his head back against his comrade’s shoulder, Warren looks wanly up toward the attacking Redcoats. The bodies of the dead and dying from both armies lie on the ground, fallen in the thrust of the battle. The wounded lie at the edge of the combat, beneath the very feet of the forward soldiers clashing in the heat of battle. Near the center of the conflict, a wounded British soldier is half-collapsed in the arms of fellow soldiers who, on either side of him, support his sagging body. A dark-coated member of the Revolutionary force, in the lower right corner, points his sword uphill toward the center of action. The strong diagonal created by the sword continues past the mass of fighting men on up to two flags flying from highly held staffs in the upper left corner of the canvas. The dark lower left corner with its fallen figures and the dark upper right corner filled with threatening storm clouds edged with a red that seems to echo the blood flowing from the wounded soldiers, accentuates the diagonal uphill thrust of red-coated British forces and defending dark-coated Revolutionary forces. The painting is strong and forceful and, with so many figures portrayed, it leaves the impression of being a much larger painting than its actual size.
After producing the second battle scene in the series, The Death of Montgomery in the Attack of Quebec, 1786, Trumbull depicted an interior scene. The theme for the painting, The Declaration of Independence, was no less ambitious. In the thirty-inch-wide painting, he included the figures of the forty-eight signers. All except two of them were painted from life. In preparation for the finished work, Trumbull created thirty-six individual miniature portraits. In order to accurately portray the participants, Trumbull returned to America where the signers posed for the miniature portraits he produced. Although The Declaration of Independence was begun in 1786, it was finished more than a decade later, in 1797.
During the period that Trumbull worked on The Declaration of Independence, the individual portraits he produced include the thirty-inch by twenty-four-inch portrait, Alexander Hamilton, c.1792. In the chest and shoulders depiction, Hamilton is shown in a frontal view gazing off to one side. A white shirt with a lace-bordered bow fills the neck of his high-collared beige suit jacket. Gray haired with a rosy complexion, Hamilton wears a gentle expression. Another portrait dated c.1792 is entitled George Washington Before the Battle of Trenton. In the outdoor scene, bareheaded Washington, in dress uniform, stands tall near his rearing white horse that is being controlled by an attending soldier. With his left hand at his hip, he pushes aside his yellow lined, long navy blue uniform coat with gold epaulettes and gold buttons. His yellow vest and fitted pants, with a pair of knee-high black boots, complete his uniform. With his right arm, holding a small roll, Washington reaches out to one side.
Trumbull returned to England and continued to paint historical themes. He also acted as a commissioner of the Jay Treaty that was signed in 1794. The purpose of the treaty was to resolve disputes between England and America that followed the Revolutionary War. During the 1790's, Trumbull tried several business ventures in Europe. One involved buying paintings by old masters from aristocrats in France who were in financial difficulties due to the revolution. He planned to resell the paintings in England at a profit. Unfortunately, a swamped boat damaged some of the paintings. The sea also defeated another business undertaking, that of importing French brandy to England, when the vessel transporting the shipment of brandy went aground.
In 1800, Trumbull married Sarah Hope Harvey, an Englishwoman who was an amateur painter. Four years later they traveled to America. At the age of forty-eight, Trumbull established himself as a portraitist in New York. In addition to portraits and paintings of historical and religious subjects, he also produced landscape paintings.
Between 1806 and 1808, Trumbull made trips to upper New York State where he painted scenes from nature, including views of Niagara Falls. He took paintings of the falls to London with him in 1808, when he and his wife returned to England. He expected to find a market for the paintings, since depictions of Niagara Falls were popular in London at that time. He finished one of his paintings of the falls, as seen from below on the British side, after he arrived in England. Trumbull and his wife remained in London for seven years before again sailing to America.
Following years of alternately spending extended periods of time in America and England, Trumbull returned to live permanently in New York. A year later, in 1817, he was commissioned by the government in Washington D.C. to paint a series of four murals for the rotunda of the capitol. He planned to produce large-scale replicas of four scenes from his original series of paintings based on the Revolutionary War.
The same year, John Trumbull was elected president of the New York Academy of the Fine Arts. The Academy had been founded in New York City in 1802. Established and supported by some of the leading citizens of the city, it was both organized and run by laymen. As president, John Trumbull was the only artist on the board of the New York Academy. One of the benefits of the office was the studio given Trumbull in the Academy building where the plaster cast collection was stored. The cast gallery, supposedly available to students during specific morning hours, was not always open. And when open, it was often unheated. Trumbull was in a position to help the students but failed to do so. He displayed little concern for making the Academy’s facilities available to young artists. Problems developed. Dissident students set up their own studio in rented quarters in order to draw from casts, some of which were borrowed from the Academy.
That situation and Trumbull’s proud nature, led to a dispute between the Academy and a group of students who formed a splinter group, in November of 1825, which they called The Society for the Improvement of Drawing. At that point, the Drawing Society was still affiliated with the New York Academy of the Fine Arts. Because of increasing friction, the Drawing Society, agreed to form a separate art academy on January 19, 1826. They named the new art school the National Academy of Design, with Samuel F.B. Morse as president elect.
During that period, Trumbull produced the rotunda murals. Events chosen for the four large murals include: The Surrender of General Burgoyne at Saratoga, The Surrender of Lord Cornwallis at Yorktowne, The Declaration of Independence and The Resignation of Washington.
The painting depicting the Declaration of Independence is perhaps the best known of the large murals. In the scene, the five-man committee responsible for drafting the Declaration of Independence includes, from left to right: John Adams, Roger Sherman, Robert R. Livingston, Thomas Jefferson and Benjamin Franklin. Standing just off center, they present their document to the Second Continental Congress. All five men look toward the individual who presides over the event. Wearing a dark suit, he is seated behind a large table covered with a gold-edged black cloth that hangs nearly to the floor. The tablecloth is covered with papers and books. On the right side of the composition there are approximately a dozen men, both standing and seated. Many of the men, attending the occasion, also sit or stand in rows on the left side of the painting. The observers, on both sides of the room, focus their attention on the five individuals standing in a tight group in front of the table. Adams, dressed in a knee-length suit, stands with his right hand on his hip. Beside him, Sherman dressed in a gray suit can be seen past Adams’ rather stocky body. Only the upper part of Livingston’s body is visible. He wears a black jacket and his dark hair repeats the color of his attire. Jefferson’s figure is portrayed in a slightly more active stance than the others. He stands closest to the table they face. Jefferson, who wrote the document, holds the corner of one page with his right hand, raising it slightly from the surface of the table, while his left hand holds another sheet of paper. His figure is shown from the hips up on the far side of the table surface. All are imposing figures. However Jefferson, wearing a bright red vest and black jacket, both trimmed with round brass buttons, captures attention. Red-haired Jefferson towers over the gray-haired, dark-suited Franklin, who stands beside him holding his glasses with his right hand. The carefully rendered portrait of each signer adds particular importance to the work.
When completed in 1824, the Rotunda murals did not receive good reviews. Critics compared them with the much smaller original paintings, produced in West’s studio thirty years earlier, and considered the murals less successful. They pointed out that the color was less impressive and there was some distortion in the large murals, which average twelve by eighteen feet.
Trumbull’s contemporary and old friend, Horatio Greenough, considered the criticism overly harsh, although he also found some details disturbing. Greenough judged The Declaration of Independence, to be the best of the Rotunda murals. He admired the skill with which Trumbull had collected so many portraits without theatrical effect. However, he criticized some particulars of the composition. The details he mentioned were the left hand of the figure of Adams, that he thought wasawkwardly pushed forward, and the left arm of Jefferson, which he regarded as incorrect. Horatio Greenough made reference to John Randolph’s sarcastically calling the painting the “Shin Piece,” in reference to the row of seated individuals in the composition.
Trumbull was in his sixties when he completed his Rotunda murals. The fact that they were unfavorably compared with his earlier, smaller versions of the same theme must have been a disappointment to him. However, it is interesting to note that Trumbull achieved the goal stated years before of recording for posterity the depiction of scenes from the Revolutionary War and the likenesses of those involved. Whereas his smaller paintings on that theme remain largely unknown by the general public, the Rotunda murals are constantly viewed by the multitudes who visit the Capitol building in Washington D.C. each year.
As he grew older, John Trumbull had a number of unsold paintings on his hands and was in need of funds. He made an arrangement with Yale University whereby he received an annuity for the remainder of his life in exchange for all his unsold work. The Trumbull Gallery was established to house Yale University's newly acquired collection of Trumbull’s paintings.
During his last years, John Trumbull painted a series of landscapes in a manner similar to the style of Thomas Cole and the group of American landscape artists referred to as the Hudson River School. Trumbull’s paintings of Niagara Falls preceded by fifty years the well-known depiction of the same subject by Cole’s student, the artist Frederic E. Church.
John Trumbull died November 10, 1843 in New York City at age eighty-seven, and was buried beside his wife where the Trumbull Gallery is located on the Yale University Campus in New Haven, Connecticut. Trumbull had achieved success in his career. He not only was recognized as an important artist during his lifetime, as president of the New York Academy of the Fine Arts John Trumbull was an acknowledged leader in the field of art education.