Book Discussion at the KIA: Revolution in Color: The World of John Singleton Copley

Revolution in Color: The World of John Singleton Copley by Jane Kamensky, with discussion leader Pam Boudreau.

This bold new history recovers an unknown American Revolution as seen through the eyes of Boston-born painter John Singleton Copley who became, by the 1760s, colonial America’s premier painter. His brush captured the faces of his neighbors ordinary men like Paul Revere, John Hancock, and Samuel Adams who would become the revolutionary heroes of a new United States. Today, in museums across America, Copley’s brilliant portraits evoke patriotic fervor and rebellious optimism.

An intimate portrait of the artist and his extraordinary times, Jane Kamensky’s A Revolution in Color masterfully reveals the world of the American Revolution, a place in time riven by divided loyalties and tangled sympathies. Much like the world in which he lived, Copley’s life and career were marked by spectacular rises and devastating falls. But though his ambivalence cost him dearly, the painter’s achievements in both Britain and America made him a towering figure of both nations’ artistic legacies.