George Washington "Athenaeum Version" by Gilbert Stuart

George Washington (“Athenaeum” version), ca. 1810 - 1818

Gilbert Stuart (American, 1755–1828)

Oil on panel

Gift of William Newton Mercer, U1875.1.2

During George Washington’s second term as U.S. president, his wife Martha commissioned portraits of herself and her husband from artist Gilbert Stuart. Despite frequent requests, however, the paintings never made it to Mount Vernon. Although Washington's jaw and mouth look stiff and uncomfortable due to a new set of ill-fitting dentures, Stuart was so satisfied with the resulting likeness that he kept the unfinished canvases as sources for his many replicas. He painted approximately 75 replicas of George Washington, each with slight variations, including this darker version painted late in Stuart’s life.

In 1796, the year that Washington sat for Stuart for the original of this portrait, the President gave to Liberty Hall Academy 100 shares of James River Canal stock in support of education west of the Blue Ridge Mountains. In gratitude, the trustees renamed the school Washington Academy, predecessor of Washington and Lee University. Eight decades later, this particular painting was part of an 1875 gift of six portraits from Dr. William N. Mercer of New Orleans, which formed the original foundation of the university’s current art collection. It hung along with many other portraits on the stage wall of the university chapel from 1875 until the early 1960s. It now hangs in the universirty chapel exhibition Setting the Stage.