biography of Ralph EARL (1751-1801)

Birth place: Worcester County, MA

Death place: Bolton, CT

Profession: Portrait and landscape painter

Exhibited: Royal Academy, London, 1778 -85

Work: Yale Univ. Art Gallery; NMAA; Amherst (MA) College; Wadsworth Atheneum, Hartford, CT; CGA; BMFA; MMA; Worcester Art Mus.; Litchfield (CT) Hist. Soc.

Comments: One of the leading American portrait painters of the late 18th century. He established himself as a painter in New Haven (CT) by 1774 and in 1775 completed what many modern critics consider his masterpiece, the portrait of the patriot Roger Sherman (Yale Univ.). Earl also painted several historical scenes at this time, recording four contemporary battles (one survives as an engraving by his friend Amos Doolittle--View of the Town of Concord"). Forced to leave for England in early 1778 because of his Loyalist sympathies, Earl spent the next seven years painting portraits in London and in the County of Norfolk. He also became part of Benjamin West's circle and may have traveled with him to Windsor. After returning to America in 1785 Earl went first to Boston and then to NYC, where he accumulated debts and was forced to spend more than a year in jail. After his release in 1788 and throughout the 1790s he traveled through New York state, Connecticut, Vermont, and Massachusetts, painting polished portraits that show the lessons learned from his years in England. Many include personal attributes of the sitter as background (as in "Elijah Boardman," 1789, MMA) and he often incorporated landscape backgrounds as well. Earl also painted a few pure landscapes. He was the brother of James Earl and father of Ralph E.W. Earl (see entries on each). Also appears as Earle.

Sources: G&W; Sawitzky, Ralph Earl 1751-1801; Phillips, "Ralph Earl, Loyalist"; DAB; Graves; Gottesman, II, [7]; Cowdrey, "The Stryker Sisters by Ralph Earl"; Reese, "A Newly Discovered Landscape by Ralph Earl"; Yale University Gallery of Fine Arts, Connecticut Portraits by Ralph Earl, foreword by William Sawitzky; Goodrich, "Ralph Earl"; Flexner, The Light of Distant Skies. More recently, see Elizabeth M. Kornhauser, Ralph Earl: The Face of the Young Republic (Yale Univ. Press, for the Wadsworth Atheneum, 1991); Baigell, Dictionary; 300 Years of American Art, 61; Craven, Colonial American Portraiture, 59. "