Arts & Leisure
Shelburne Museum acquires John Singleton Copley portrait

SHELBURNE — Shelburne Museum has acquired a portrait by John Singleton Copley entitled “Mrs. John Scollay (Mercy Greenleaf),” a pendant painting to the portrait in the museum’s permanent collection, “Mr. John Scollay,” reuniting the long-separated portraits of wife and husband, Shelburne Museum Director Thomas Denenberg announced.
John Scollay, a chairman of the Boston Board of Selectmen and member of the Sons of Liberty, commissioned Copley (1738-1815), the preeminent portraiture artist in the American colonies, for this portrait of his wife as a pendant to his own portrait. Completed in 1763, Mrs. Scollay’s portrait demonstrates Copley’s talents and abilities as a painter as evidenced through the beautifully rendered fabric draped around the sitter.
Shelburne Museum founder Electra Havemeyer Webb assembled the American paintings collection with the intention of juxtaposing well-known artists such as Copley with lesser-known itinerant or “folk” painters. She purchased the portrait of John Scollay from Harry Shaw Newman at the Old Print Shop in New York City in 1959. The Museum’s extensive collection of American paintings tell a story about how the fine arts developed and came of age in the United States, and the reunion of these pendants continues to enrich the narrative.
To for more info visit shelburnemuseum.org.
More News
Arts & Leisure
GAME ON! Circus Smirkus gets ready to have some fun in Middlebury
Circus Smirkus will bring its 2025 Big Top Tour: Game On! to Middlebury on the green next … (read more)
Arts & Leisure
A youthful take on ‘Midsummer’
The Young Company will perform “A Midsummer Night’s Dream” on Middlebury Town Hall Theatre … (read more)
Arts & Leisure
Brandon artist honored with 2025 Herb Lockwood Prize in the Arts
Brandon artist and teacher Will Kasso Condry received the 2025 Herb Lockwood Prize in the … (read more)