John Neagle
(1796 - 1865)
John Neagle was a fashionable American painter, primarily of portraits, during the first half of the 19th century in Philadelphia.
Neagle was born in Boston, Massachusetts. His training in art began with instruction from the drawing-master Pietro Ancora and an apprenticeship to Thomas Wilson, a well-connected painter of signs and coaches in Philadelphia. Wilson introduced him to the painters Bass Otis and Thomas Sully, and Neagle became a protégé of the latter. In 1818 Neagle decided to concentrate exclusively on portraits, setting up shop as an independent master.
Aside from brief sojourns in Lexington, Kentucky, and New Orleans, Louisiana, he spent his career in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, where he died. In May 1826 he married Sully's stepdaughter Mary, and for a time the son-in-law and father-in-law dominated the field of portraiture in the city. Neagle served as Director of the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, and was also a founder and president (1835–43) of the Artist's Fund Society of Philadelphia.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Neagle
Pat Lyon at the Forge
1961
Oil on canvas
238 x 172 cm
Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, US
http://www.mfa.org/collections/object/pat-lyon-at-the-forge-34216
Patrick Lyon (c. 1769, Edinburgh, Scotland – April 15, 1829, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania) was a Scottish-born American blacksmith, mechanic and inventor. After being falsely accused and imprisoned for a 1798 bank robbery, he became a working class hero. A self-made businessman, he was among the foremost American makers of hand-pumped fire engines.
Artist John Neagle's portrait of him, Pat Lyon at the Forge (1826–27), alludes to his unjust imprisonment, and is an iconic work in American art.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Patrick_Lyon_(blacksmith)



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