Artist:
N.C. Wyeth
(American, 1882 - 1945)
William Penn, Man of Vision · Courage · Action
Medium: Oil on canvas
Date: 1933
Dimensions:
168 × 132 1/4 in. (426.7 × 335.9 cm)
Brandywine River Museum of Art, Gift of Penn Mutual Life Insurance Company, 1997
Accession number: 97.15
Copyright: The Penn Mutual Life Insurance Company until 2029
Research Number: NCW: 823
InscribedLower right: N. C. WYETH / -1933-
ProvenancePenn Mutual Life Insurance Company, Philadelphia, PA, 1933-1997
References
"An Interview with the Artist," published in William Penn, Man of Vision · Courage · Action, A Mural Painting by N. C. Wyeth (Philadelphia, PA: Penn Mutual Life Insurance Company, n.d.); Douglas Allen and Douglas Allen, Jr., N. C. Wyeth The Collected Paintings, Illustrations and Murals (New York: Crown Publishers, Inc., 1972), p. 164; "The N. C. Wyeth Studio," American Art Review, vol. X, No. 3, 1998, color illustraton p. 173; Christine B. Podmaniczky, N. C. Wyeth, A Catalogue Raisonné of Paintings (London: Scala, 2008), M.48, p. 621; Christine B. Podmaniczky, "N. C. Wyeth, American Regionalist" in Rural Modern, American Art Beyond the City (NY: Rizzoli, 2016), p. 170, illus. in color, p. 170;
Curatorial RemarksWilliam Penn, the mural’s central figure, divides the canvas into a past and future; on the right, the dark, menacing environs of late 17th century London, and on the left, the idyllic “sylvan” landscape of the New World where Penn will establish his colony. Penn holds in his hand the 1681 charter granted by the rose-velvet clad Charles II. Below Penn’s right hand is the Quaker George Fox, a founder of the Religious Society of Friends. A band of Quakers look past Penn’s ship The Welcome, up the Delaware River toward life in Pennsylvania, free from religious persecution.
The Wyeth family has home movie footage of N. C. Wyeth working on this mural. Some of that footage is reproduced in the video "Andrew Wyeth Self-portrait: Snow Hill" (Chip Taylor Communications, 1995).The Penn Mutual Life Insurance Company holds a smaller version in oil, undoubtedly the presentation piece (NCW 822), the 1932 contract between the artist and the company, and an archival photograph of the artist posing in front of the mural installed in the original site. The Brandywine River Museum holds lantern slides of the composition drawn in charcoal and squared for transfer (NCWS.95.1825.4-9). Penn Mutual reproduced the image in color in a Penn Mutual brochure with a statement by the artist explaining the "dramatic purpose" of the mural and identifying many of the figures portrayed (copy, Brandywine River Museum library, N. C. Wyeth collection); and on postcards for the William Penn Tercentenary in 1944.
The mural was installed in Penn Mutual's Home Office building on Independence Square, Philadelphia, in 1933. In the early 1970s, conservator Timothy Jayne of Oxford, Pennsylvania, was hired to remove the mural from the wall and attach it to a strainer. It was repositioned in a new Penn Mutual building adjacent to the older one. After Penn Mutual gave the mural to the Brandywine River Museum in 1997, Jayne also directed the installation of the mural in the artist's studio in Chadds Ford.
The Wyeth family has home movie footage of N. C. Wyeth working on this mural. Some of that footage is reproduced in the video "Andrew Wyeth Self-portrait: Snow Hill" (Chip Taylor Communications, 1995).The Penn Mutual Life Insurance Company holds a smaller version in oil, undoubtedly the presentation piece (NCW 822), the 1932 contract between the artist and the company, and an archival photograph of the artist posing in front of the mural installed in the original site. The Brandywine River Museum holds lantern slides of the composition drawn in charcoal and squared for transfer (NCWS.95.1825.4-9). Penn Mutual reproduced the image in color in a Penn Mutual brochure with a statement by the artist explaining the "dramatic purpose" of the mural and identifying many of the figures portrayed (copy, Brandywine River Museum library, N. C. Wyeth collection); and on postcards for the William Penn Tercentenary in 1944.
The mural was installed in Penn Mutual's Home Office building on Independence Square, Philadelphia, in 1933. In the early 1970s, conservator Timothy Jayne of Oxford, Pennsylvania, was hired to remove the mural from the wall and attach it to a strainer. It was repositioned in a new Penn Mutual building adjacent to the older one. After Penn Mutual gave the mural to the Brandywine River Museum in 1997, Jayne also directed the installation of the mural in the artist's studio in Chadds Ford.
Image Source for printed Catalogue Raisonne:1. Transparency directly from painting; 2. The artist in front of the mural as originally installed in Penn Mutual building, Independence Square, Philadelphia, PA, 1933
Photo Credit:1. Rick Echelmeyer, 1997; 2. Archival photograph courtesy Archives of The Penn Mutual Life Insurance Company
On view