Highlights of the American Collection
Now Open
Free
Visit the exhibition site.

This exhibition showcases a selection of the finest American paintings from the Museum’s American Collection, which has been off view since June 2007. The approximately 20 paintings will be arranged thematically, allowing for interesting and surprising conversations among works by different artists from different generations. 

The star of the exhibition is the stunning portrait of Sir William Pepperrell and His Family, one of the true masterpieces of John Singleton Copley, America’s first great artist.  The Museum’s conservators have recently completed the first extensive cleaning of this painting—taken off view in July 2005—in 40 years. Cleaning has revealed new details of the composition and restored much of the 18^th-century luster to this celebrated portrayal of an American Tory gentleman and his young family.

Presented by:

The rarest jewel of the collection is Richard Pousette-Dart’s ethereal Golden Dawn from 1952. Pousette-Dart insisted that art can reveal “the significant life . . . it uplifts, transforms [life] into the exalted realm of reality wherein its pure contemplative poetic being takes place—wherein art’s transcendental language of form, spirit, harmony means one universal eternal presence.”  That almost prayerful sentiment was shared by the Leslies, whose art collection reflected an unshakable faith in the transformative power of the painted image. Organized by the North Carolina Museum of Art.