Painted Portraits

Painted portraits represented the most accurate way to capture the likeness of yourself or your loved one before the age of photography—but it came at a significant cost. Even if you could afford to have your portrait painted, you had to engage the services of a professional artist. In the more rural areas of the country, skilled portrait artists could be difficult to come by.

Wylie House has a painted portrait of both Wylie patriarchs: Andrew Wylie, who lived in the house from 1835-1851, and Theophilus Adam Wylie, who lived in the house from 1859-1895. One portrait was commissioned in the cosmopolitan city of Philadelphia, the other was likely painted in rural Bloomington.

Portrait of Theophilus Adam Wylie

Portrait of Theophilus Adam Wylie as a young man.

Portrait of Andrew Wylie

Portrait of Andrew Wylie.

While the portrait of Andrew Wylie is charming, it lacks the realism and polish of the Theophilus Wylie painting. Theophilus sat for this portrait as a young man in Philadelphia. He was the son of an influential and wealthy pastor, Samuel Brown Wylie. In 1832, the Philadelphia Wylies commissioned Charles Bird King to paint the above portrait of Theophilus. He writes of the experience in an August 13, 1832 diary entry:

"In order that men might know what I look like at the present time, it became necessary for me to have my portrait painted, and in order to accomplish this for some days back I have been exposing my face to the gaze of Mr King who had been daily and hourly transferring my features to the canvas."

Theophilus was 22 at the time. By contrast, we know little of the provenance of our Andrew Wylie portrait. The portrait is unsigned, but there is some evidence to believe it was painted by Marion Blair in the early 1850s. It is likely a copy of an existing painting.

Andrew Wylie was one of the most important individuals in Bloomington at the time—and one of the wealthiest. The amateur quality of his portrait goes to show how difficult and rare it was to commission a professional portrait at the rural fringes of American society in the mid-19th century.

Theophilus Adam Wylie self-portrait sketch

"T.A. Wylie (by himself with mirrored Looking Glass.) 1832"

Alternative Portrait Methods

Those who could not afford to have their portrait painted or who didn’t have access to a trained artist found ways to record their likeness and remember their loved ones without formal paintings. For those with some artistic talent, sketches filled the role (to varying degrees of accuracy). The Theophilus Wylie family was particularly prone to sketching when they had a spare moment.

Theophilus Wylie sketched the self-portrait at left in1832, the same year that Charles Bird King painted his portrait. Compare the images. Did Theophilus capture his own likeness?

Sketches were quick, easy, and inexpensive, but they are limited by the skill of the artist. Less artistically-inclined individuals were in need of an accurate way to make portraits quickly and cheaply. Silhouettes came to be a popular solution to this problem.

Painted Portraits