Anna Claypoole Peale

James Peale

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

James Peale trained his daughter Anna Claypoole Peale in the art of painting miniature portraits in watercolor on ivory. She began her career assisting him with his work when his eyesight began to fail, but eventually pursued the medium on her own—as it was, according to her father, "the most suitable employment for a lady." During her lifetime, she completed more than two hundred miniatures, including the two portraits displayed here. In 1824, she and her sister Sarah Miriam Peale were elected academicians at the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts—the first women so honored.

The American Wing

An exhibit at Metropolitan Museum of Art

The American Wing's ever-evolving collection comprises some 20,000 works of art by African American, Euro American, Latin American, and Native American men and women. Ranging from the colonial to early-modern periods, the holdings include painting, sculpture, works on paper, and decorative arts—including furniture, textiles, ceramics, glass, silver, metalwork, jewelry, basketry, quill and bead embroidery—as well as historical interiors and architectural fragments.

Metropolitan Museum of Art