Painted Personas: The Portraits of George Caleb Bingham

June 10 – September 23, 2017

Main Gallery, Columbia Research Center

The State Historical Society of Missouri is home to over two dozen portraits by the celebrated American painter George Caleb Bingham. These artworks were originally produced for a variety of venues, from the homes of private citizens to the halls of government buildings. Painted Personas examines the varied functions of Bingham's portraiture and considers how dress, gesture, and background communicated carefully choreographed messages related to the paintings' original settings as well as the subjects' roles within families, society, and nineteenth-century culture. Among the paintings on display will be a portrait of Thomas Jefferson, an image of the sculptress Vinnie Ream, and several portraits on long-term loan from the descendants of James S. Rollins.