Pat Lyon At The Forge Essay -- John Neagle Artist Painter

Pat Lyon at The hammerJohn Neagle painted the portrait Pat Lyon at the Forge between 1826 and 1827. Just 50 years after the beginning of the American Revolution, this painting shows how much America had evolved. Neagles portrait is a powerful exultation of productive labor (p 281) and the, entrepreneurial and commercial energies that transformed the country (p 8). It conveys the notion of republican equality (p 241) that timberland discusses and how was important it was to the leaders of the Revolution.While portraits had earlier been an exclusive luxury of the aristocracy (p 354), Neagles portrait is a break from that tradition. The painting depicts a blacksmith working in his forge with a young boy, possibly an apprentice, looking on behind him. Pay Lyon looks nought like an aristocrat. He is a laborer, hard at work with his enclothe unbuttoned and sleeves rolled up. In traditional European society, gentlemen didn?t work, only(prenominal) common people did. ?The liberal ity for which gentlemen were known connoted freedom ? freedom from satisfying want?and freedom from having ...