Mary Jane Peale (born

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...

, February 16, 1827 - died Pottsville,

Pennsylvania Pennsylvania (; ( Pennsylvania Dutch: )), officially the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, is a state spanning the Mid-Atlantic, Northeastern, Appalachian, and Great Lakes regions of the United States. It borders Delaware to its southeast, ...

, November 22, 1902) was an American painter. She was the child of

Rubens Sir Peter Paul Rubens (; ; 28 June 1577 – 30 May 1640) was a Flemish artist and diplomat from the Duchy of Brabant in the Southern Netherlands (modern-day Belgium). He is considered the most influential artist of the Flemish Baroque traditio ...

and Eliza Burd Patterson Peale, the only daughter among seven children, and was the granddaughter of

Charles Willson Peale Charles Willson Peale (April 15, 1741 – February 22, 1827) was an American Painting, painter, soldier, scientist, inventor, politician and naturalist. He is best remembered for his portrait paintings of leading figures of the American Revolu ...

. She was among the last members of the Peale family to paint professionally, studying with her uncle

Rembrandt Rembrandt Harmenszoon van Rijn (, ; 15 July 1606 – 4 October 1669), usually simply known as Rembrandt, was a Dutch Golden Age painter, printmaker and draughtsman. An innovative and prolific master in three media, he is generally consid ...

and with

Thomas Sully Thomas Sully (June 19, 1783November 5, 1872) was a portrait painter in the United States. Born in Great Britain, he lived most of his life in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. He painted in the style of Thomas Lawrence. His subjects included nationa ...

Philadelphia Philadelphia, often called Philly, is the largest city in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, the sixth-largest city in the U.S., the second-largest city in both the Northeast megalopolis and Mid-Atlantic regions after New York City. Sinc ...

, and was enrolled at the

Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts Pennsylvania (; (Pennsylvania Dutch: )), officially the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, is a state spanning the Mid-Atlantic, Northeastern, Appalachian, and Great Lakes regions of the United States. It borders Delaware to its southeast, Maryl ...

. She produced mainly

portrait A portrait is a portrait painting, painting, portrait photography, photograph, sculpture, or other artistic representation of a person, in which the face and its expressions are predominant. The intent is to display the likeness, Personality type ...

s and

still life A still life (plural: still lifes) is a work of art depicting mostly wikt:inanimate, inanimate subject matter, typically commonplace objects which are either natural (food, flowers, dead animals, plants, rocks, shells, etc.) or artificiality, m ...

s, many of which featured flowers. Today her work may be seen at the

Smithsonian American Art Museum The Smithsonian American Art Museum (commonly known as SAAM, and formerly the National Museum of American Art) is a museum in Washington, D.C., part of the Smithsonian Institution. Together with its branch museum, the Renwick Gallery, SAAM holds o ...

, the

Sheldon Museum of Art The Sheldon Museum of Art is an art museum in the city of Lincoln, in the state of Nebraska in the Midwestern United States. Its collection focuses on 19th- and 20th-century art. History Sheldon Art Association In 1888, The Sheldon Art Assoc ...

, and the

Westmoreland Museum of American Art The Westmoreland Museum of American Art is an art museum in Greensburg, Pennsylvania devoted to American art, with a particular concentration on the art of southwestern Pennsylvania. Art lover Mary Marchand Woods bequeathed her entire estate to e ...

, among other museums. She maintained a greenhouse at the Peale family home. The papers and diaries of Mary Jane Peale are located in the American Philosophical Society in Philadelphia, PA, and include both original diaries and correspondence as well as photocopies. The contents of the collection is material related to Rubens and Eliza Peale, and the Peale family. Microfilm copies of this collection can be found in the Library of the Smithsonian Institution. She is credited with teaching her father to paint, after his retirement, and there is evidence that some of the works attributed to him (such as ''Wedding Cake, Wine, Almonds, and Raisins'' and ''Rubens Peale in His Studio'') may have instead been collaborative creations between the two. After Rubens died in 1865, Mary Jane finished the paintings he had been working on. In her obituary, the New York Times said, "For a number of years she made her home in this city, but for several years had resided in Schuylkill County, at her place, "Riverside," the home of her childhood, on whose walls hung many ancient paintings by members of her family and portraits of Revolutionary heroes painted by her grandfather."

References

''Portrait of Eliza Burd Patterson Peale''
at the

Southern Alleghenies Museum of Art The Southern Alleghenies Museum of Art (SAMA) is an art museum with five locations in southwestern Pennsylvania in the United States. It is headquartered at Saint Francis University in Loretto, where it was founded in 1976. Other locations were o ...

Mary Peale
at artnet *''The Peale Family: Creation of a Legacy: 1770-1870''. Lillian B. Miller, ed. Abbeville Press, 1996. {{DEFAULTSORT:Peale, Mary Jane 1827 births 1902 deaths Mary Jane American women painters Painters from New York City Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts alumni People from Pottsville, Pennsylvania Painters from Pennsylvania 19th-century American painters 19th-century American women artists 20th-century American women artists