The American Collector magazine was a publication which ran from 1933 to 1948,  and served antique collectors and dealers.  Three articles from its archives have recently been published online, and are of interest to collectors of American miniatures.  The links are as follows:

http://www.collectorsweekly.com/articles/washington-memorial-jewelry/  

http://www.collectorsweekly.com/articles/colonial-americans-and-their-jewelry/

http://www.collectorsweekly.com/articles/primitive-american-portraits/

Archibald Robertson (1765-1835)  is a well-known miniaturist, but few may know of his wife, Eliza Robertson, nee Abramse (1776-1865.).  Robertson and his brother Alexander emigrated from Scotland to America, and together set up the Columbian Academy of Painting, one of the earliest schools in America. Eliza Abramse was one of his students, and became a talented amateur artist, exhibiting several times at the American Academy of Fine Arts.  Eliza came from an old Dutch family,  one of the original settlers of New York,  their homestead located in Wall Street.  Archibald and Eliza married in 1794, and had six sons and four daughters. 

The Henry Luce III Center for the Study of American Culture has a self-portrait miniature by Eliza Robertson, as well as a miniature of her painted by her husband, which was part of the exhibition Tokens of Affection: The Portrait Miniature in America , at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the National Museum of American Art, and the Art Institute of Chicago in 1991. The Center also has a self-portrait miniature by Archibald Robertson, and a miniature painted by Archibald of their son Anthony Lispenard Robertson. Anthony was a noted jurist, serving as assistant vice-chancellor of the State of New York in 1846-48 and as surrogate judge of New York County in the latter year. In 1859 he was elected a judge of the superior court of New York City and in 1866 was chosen chief justice, an office he held until his death two years later.

Information compiled from the Center’s catalogue text for the miniatures, as well as from The Century Illustrated Monthly Magazine, May 1890 to October 1890, Volume XL.  

Wiebold Studio was recently filmed for OurOhio.org , and the video may be seen on YouTube. For those of you who’ve used Wiebold or know of them, Jerry Litamer and Dave Davis are the two integral conservators at Wiebold who conserve miniatures and their frames, and a miniature is discussed in the video. See http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kq6F-w650RI  .

From www.OurOhio.org: Since 1945 Wiebold Studio, Inc. has restored and repaired the art and antiques of homeowners, collectors and dealers. Wiebold conservators repair and restore oil paintings and fine art, ceramics, metal-ware, portrait miniatures and many other small historical objects and objects d’arte. Some of the company’s clients include The White House, Yale University, the Taft Museum and the Cincinnati Art Museum.

The Intimate Portrait:
Drawings, Miniatures and Pastels from Ramsay to Lawrence

Exhibition organised by the National Galleries of Scotland and the British Museum,  5 March – 31 May 2009,
Room 90.

The first ever major UK exhibition to examine a fascinating but relatively unknown aspect of British portraiture will open at the British Museum this spring. The Intimate Portrait will explore the period between the 1730s and the 1830s – the heyday of British portraiture – when some of the country’s greatest artists produced beautifully worked portraits in pencil, chalks, watercolours and pastels that were often exhibited, sold and displayed as finished works of art. Jointly organised by the National Galleries of Scotland and the British Museum, this exhibition of 180 works will draw upon the superb (and largely unexplored) holdings of intimate portrait drawings in the collections of both institutions, as well as upon important private collections that have been placed on long-term loan at the Scottish National Portrait Gallery. Highlights will include masterpieces by Allan Ramsay, Thomas Gainsborough, Joshua Reynolds, Richard Cosway, John Downman, Archibald Skirving, Charlotte Jones, Sarah Biffin, Thomas Lawrence, and David Wilkie, among others.

The exhibition is arranged thematically to look at artists’ self-portraits and images of their families and friends, as well as their portrayal of the rising middle classes and the celebrities of the day. Well-known sitters include Prince Charles Edward Stuart, Robert Burns, Walter Scott, Lady Hamilton, the Duke of Wellington and the young Queen Victoria. Intimate portraits are revealed to be important indicators of contemporary taste and ideas of ‘sentiment’, particularly through the many portraits of women and of children. The exhibition explores how and why they were made, where they were displayed and, above all, their qualities as portraits that are ‘intimate’ in the multiple senses of the word.

The exhibition will be accompanied by a fully illustrated catalogue, priced £25; written by co-curators Dr Stephen Lloyd, Senior Curator at the Scottish National Portrait Gallery, and by Dr Kim Sloan, Curator of British Drawings and Watercolours before 1880 at the British Museum.

The exhibition will be shown first at the Scottish National Portrait Gallery, Edinburgh from 25 October 2008 – 1 February 2009.

A number of lectures and gallery talks will accompany the exhibition. For more information check online or contact the press office.

For further information on the exhibition, or images: Katrina Whenham 020 7323 8583 kwhenham@britishmuseum.org .  See also www.britishmuseum.org  to order the catalogue.