John Singleton Copley, Mary and Elizabeth Royall, c.1758. Oil on canvas, 57 3/8 x 48 1/8 in. The Museum of Fine Arts, Boston.
John Singleton Copley and the Visual Culture of Slavery
(in progress)
This is the first monographic study to analyze the Anglo-American artist’s work and career in the context of the transatlantic slave trade.
Related Publications
“In the Flesh: John Singleton Copley’s Colonial Portraits and Whiteness,” Art History vol. 44, no. 5 (Nov. 2021), 948-977.
“Enslaved Labor and Cultural Capital: A Quantitative and Qualitative Analysis of Copley’s Colonial Portrait Commissions,” co-authored with Diana Greenwald, Winterthur Portfolio vol. 54, no. 4 “Enslavement and Its Legacies,” Winter 2020: 223-243.