Medium
Classification
Department
Smithsonian Collection
Museum
Smithsonian American Art Museum
Credit
National Portrait Gallery, Smithsonian Institution; gift of Mr. and Mrs. Paul Mellon
Accession Number
S/NPG.74.39.5.9
Tags
Art Historical Context
Step into the early 19th-century world of American portraiture with *John Watson* (1802), a delicate print by Charles Balthazar Févret de Saint-Mémin, a Frenchigré artist (1770–1852) who brought innovative techniques to the young United States. Working in Philadelphia and New York after fleeing the French Revolution, Saint-Mé specialized in precise profile portraits, often using a physiognotrace—a mechanicalograph device—to trace sitters' silhouettes with remarkable accuracy. He then engraved these onto copper plates, producing affordable, gem-like prints that captured the likenesses of promin...