Thomas Sully’s Philadelphians

"Peter Conn's book on the Philadelphia subjects of the artist Thomas Sully captures the aristocratic element of the city's early history ... Sully's paintings chronicled Philadelphians when the city was the nation's intellectual hub ... Mr. Conn's depiction is a welcome rejoinder to historians' recent habit of debunking America's achievements. Sully's Philadelphia added class and style to the nation's birth."—D. G. Hart, The Wall Street Journal

"I have never read a book quite like it. It discusses two dozen portraits—and their subjects—by Thomas Sully, the prolific portrait artist of nineteenth-century Philadelphia. As we read Conn’s biographies of Sully’s sitters, we realize that he is slyly giving us the history of the city itself, its institutions and ideas, as told through the makers of those institutions, and their critics."

"Thomas Sully’s Philadelphians is a work like no other. At once an expression of fierce love and elegant elegy for the city, in strokes as artful as Sully’s own, Peter Conn’s clean, swift prose paints a brilliant portrait of Philadelphia in the long half-century before it gave way to New York as the cultural capital of the United States."—Michael Zuckerman, Professor Emeritus, Department of History, University of Pennsylvania

"With a diverse and fine selection of Thomas Sully’s portraits, Peter Conn introduces us to a variety of socially and politically engaged men and women who contributed to the growth of important Philadelphia institutions dedicated to education, science, business, and the arts during the first three-quarters of the nineteenth century."—Carol Soltis, Project Associate Curator, Philadelphia Museum of Art

"Peter Conn has compiled what amounts to a splendid group portrait of early-to-mid nineteenth century Philadelphia by a single talented artist, Thomas Sully. Engagingly, this assembly of notables also reads as a tour of the great institutions, buildings, and milestones in the city celebrated in Sully’s day as “the Athens of America.”"—Kathleen A. Foster The Robert L. McNeil, Jr., Senior Curator of American Art, and Director, Center for American Art, Philadelphia Museum of Art

"Peter Conn has written an engaging and accessible exploration of Thomas Sully—the leading mid-19th-century portrait painter who should be better known today—situating him in his fertile Philadelphia environment. Underlining the importance of place for Sully’s portrait practice, Conn surveys his layered relationship with the city’s culture and society."—Sylvia Yount, Lawrence A. Fleischman Curator in Charge of the American Wing, The Metropolitan Museum of Art

"Drawing on previously unpublished material, Conn’s deeply researched, readable book dives into a pivotal historical time recorded by a pivotal artist to create an illuminating, rewarding portrait of life and art in Philadelphia."—Gail Obenreder, Broad Street Review

"Mr. Conn has a back story for every portrait, sharpening our awareness of just why Sully chose to depict his subjects in certain lights, positions, gestures, and what might be called the mise en scène of their accomplishments."—Carl Rollyson, New York Sun