Object Number 1956.0011.004 A

Object Name

Print (Mezzotint)

Title

M.\r SAMUEL ADAMS.

Category

Prints and Maps

Credit Line/Donor

Museum purchase

Creator (Role)

Samuel Okey (Mezzotinter)
The London engraver Samuel Okey arrived in Newport, Rhode Island in 1773, several years before the Revolutionary War. He was among several British engravers seeking opportunities to practice their craft in Colonial America. But in the end, he must have found it too difficult to make a living and returned to England some time before 1778, the year his work was published in London. In Newport Okey engraved and published only four or five mezzotints. Other than the prints he engraved in Rhode Island, there is very little known about him.

J. Mitchell (Painter and designer)

John Singleton Copley (Painter)
07/03/1738-09/09/1815

Charles Reak and Samuel Okay (Publisher)

Place of Origin

Newport, Newport, Rhode Island, New England, United States, North America

Date

1775

Mark or Signature or Inscription or Label

1. Inscription; Lower right; Sam\l Obey Fecit
2. Inscription; Lower left; J. Mitchell pinx.\t
3. Inscription; Lower center; Printed by and for Cha.\s Reak & Sam\l Okey Newport Rhode Island April 1775.

Subjects

Portrait; Samuel Adams

Materials

Ink; Paper (laid)

Techniques

Mezzotint with some burin work

Dimensions (inches)

13.7 (H) , 9.7 (W) , 12.2 (Image H) , 9.7 (Image W)

Dimensions (centimeters)

34.8 (H) , 24.7 (W) , 12.2 (Image H) , 9.7 (Image W)

Measurement Notes

Trimmed within plate mark. Chain interval: 3.0-3.1 cm; laid lines 11 per cm.

Publisher Summary

Charles Reak and Samuel Okay

Publication Date

1775

Place of Publication

Newport, Rhode Island, United States, North America

Watermark

None

Object Description

Text available soon.

Bibliography and Bibliographic Notes

[Book] Fowble, E. McSherry. 1991 To Please Every Taste: Eighteenth-Century Prints from the Winterthur Museum.
• Published: no.30, pp.96-97.
[Book] Henry Francis du Pont Winterthur Museum, Inc. & The Walpole Society. 1963 Prints pertaining to America: a list of publications in English, relating to prints about that portion of America now included in the United States with emphasis on the period 1650-1850: and a checklist of prints in an exhibition to commemorate the 1962. 99 p.
• Published: no. 104, p. 42.
[Book] Fowble, E. McSherry. 1987 Two Centuries of Prints in America, 1680-1880 : A Selective Catalogue of the Winterthur Museum Collection.
• Published: no. 196, pp. 300-301.
[Book] Stauffer, David McNeely. 1907 American Engravers Upon Copper and Steel.
• Print listed: no. 2370, pp, 391-392.