Collections record Beta

Portrait Miniature - Mary Ann Wolcott Whitehead (1801-1864)

2008-08-1

Portrait miniature - unframed. Thin sheet of ivory. Watercolor of young woman from waist up. Brown curly hair piled on top of her head. Light brownish/green eyes, sloped shoulders. Black dress, wide neckline, rushing across chest, large puffed sleeves, cinched at waist. Red shawl. Piece of cardstock glued to back of miniature, torn on one side.

SITTER: Mary Ann Wolcott is the daughter of Frederick Wolcott. She was born and raised in the Wolcott house on South St. across from the Tapping Reeve House. She attended the Litchfield Female Academy from 1814-1816. On May 22, 1827 she married Asa Whitehead. They had no children. ARTIST: Born in Milton, a village in the town of Litchfield, Anson Dickinson began advertising himself as a miniature painter in 1802. He traveled to New York in 1804, where he was painted by Edward Greene Malbone, the leading American miniaturist of his day. Dickinson painted over 1,500 miniatures over the course of fifty years, traveling as far as Canada and South Carolina to paint. He kept a studio in New York for a period, and returned frequently to Litchfield where he painted prominent residents and students of the Female Academy and Law School.

• Dickinson, Anson, 1779-1852

November 17, 1831

2 7/8"wide x 3 1/2" long

• ivory
• watercolor