Will the Real Stuart Stand Up?

Since 1800, the full-length portrait of George Washington that hangs in the East Room of the White House has been viewed with suitable awe by hundreds of thousands of guests and tourists. In 1814 the picture became part of the American legendry when it was removed by the doughty Dolley Madison just before the British arrived to burn the place down. What is more, the painting is by that greatest of American portraitists, Gilbert Stuart.

Or is it? Marvin Sadik, director of the National Portrait Gallery, thinks not. Sadik argues that the painting was actually by William Winstanley, an English artist who copied, as best he could, one of Stuart's works. In rebuttal, Clement Conger, curator of the White House, claims that the painting is an original Stuart and produces the original bill of sale as proof: "One portrait full length of the late Genl. Washington by Stewart with frame." (No one knows for sure who made out the document -- and misspelled Stuart's name.) Conger has neither the money nor the desire to undertake the technical studies that might prove whether or not the painting really is Stuart's. Says he:

"It is certainly the most important historical portrait in the Western Hemi sphere. Every schoolchild knows it. And, quite frankly, it doesn't matter whether it was literally painted by Gil bert Stuart himself."

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