Nathaniel Hurd (c. 1765): Art, History and Details

Nathaniel Hurd (c. 1765) is in the Cleveland Museum of Art collection. The museum's creator attribution is John Singleton Copley (American, born The Thirteen Colonies, 1738–1815).

The work and its context

The museum's open-access catalogue describes the work:

Hurd was a prominent silversmith and engraver in Boston, and the warm gaze and unforced smile in his portrait by Copley suggest the friendship between the two artists. Hurd's open-collared shirt, as well as the rakishly tilted turban that covers his shaved head in place of a ceremonial powdered wig, create an air of informality that is unusual for a portrait of this time.

Object facts

• Title: Nathaniel Hurd
• Date: c. 1765
• Creator attribution: John Singleton Copley (American, born The Thirteen Colonies, 1738–1815)
• Culture: America
• Type: Painting
• Technique: oil on canvas
• Dimensions: Framed: 90.5 x 78 x 6.5 cm (35 5/8 x 30 11/16 x 2 9/16 in.); Unframed: 76.2 x 64.8 cm (30 x 25 1/2 in.)
• Collection: American - Painting
• Department: American Painting and Sculpture
• Accession number: 1915.534

A detail from the museum

The artist Copley’s in-laws were consignees for the cargo dumped during the Boston Tea Party.

Collection credit

Gift of the John Huntington Art and Polytechnic Trust

Further reading listed by the museum

• David Franklin, and C. Griffith Mann. Treasures of the Cleveland Museum of Art. Cleveland, OH, London: Cleveland Museum of Art ; in association with Scala Publishers, 2012.
• Lange, Amanda E., "We Are Family: Heraldic Decorative Arts in Early America," Historic Deerfield 14 (Autumn 2013).
• Perkins, Augustus Thorndike. A Sketch of the Life and a List of Some of the Works of John Singleton Copley. Boston: Priv. Print, 1873.

View the collection record

See the museum's photographs and full catalogue entry. Catalogue text is reproduced from the Cleveland Museum of Art's open-access data, with HTML formatting removed. This object and its supplied image are designated CC0.