- Patience Wright
Patience Lovell Wright (born 1725,
Bordentown, New Jersey ; diedMarch 23 ,1786 ,London ) was the first recognized American-bornsculptor . She chiefly createdwax figure s of people.Wright was born into a
Quaker farm family and married Joseph Wright in 1748. [ [http://www.bordentownhistory.org/site.html "Patience Wright", Bordentown Historical Society.] ] For years, she had amused herself and her five children by molding faces out of putty, bread dough, and wax. After her husband died in 1769, her pastime became a full-time occupation as she began earning a living from molding portraits in tinted wax.In 1772, Wright traveled to England and opened a successful
wax museum .Benjamin Franklin introduced her to London society. Wright became known as the "Promethean modeller," for her New World egalitarianism and often coarse speech as well as her artwork. She was patronized by George III, and sculpted him and other members of British royalty and nobility, but fell from royal favor because of her open support for the colonial cause during theAmerican Revolution . Never forgetting her Patriot loyalties, she became a spy for the cause, often sending messages to America inside her wax figures. Wright's sculpture of friendWilliam Pitt still stands in Westminster. She loved to write poetry and was a painter.Patience Wright's son Joseph Wright (1756-1793) was a well-known portrait painter. Her daughter Phoebe married British painter
John Hoppner ; their son,Henry Parkyns Hoppner , went on to become aRoyal Navy officer andArctic explorer.Her home at 100 Farnsworth Avenue in Bordentown, New Jersey still stands. [ [http://www.downtownbordentown.com/tour_pg5.htm Downtown Bordentown Association] ]
References
*Pegi Deitz Shea, "Life in Early America:An 'Ingenius' Woman", "Early American Life" magazine, June 2008.
*cite book
first=Pegi Deitz, and Bethanne Anderson
last=Shea
title=Patience Wright:America's First Sculptor, and Revolutionary Spy
publisher=Henry Holt & Company (2006)
*cite news
first=Richard
last=Dean
url= | title=America's First Sculptor: Patience Wright Began Her Work With Dough and Putty
work=The Mentor magazine (eBay listing for copy of this issue, including full table of contents)
date=June 1926
accessdate=2006-08-16
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