Defying Empire: Revolutionary Prints from Britain and America

On the eve of America's 250th, Defying Empire: Revolutionary Prints from Britain and America explores how eighteenth-century British and American prints shaped public opinion, inviting visitors to visualize a passionate, participatory Revolution. Drawn from the collections of the Haggerty Museum of Art and the Chipstone Foundation, the exhibition brings together works by eighteenth‑century Britons and Americans to frame the period as a site of transatlantic political exchange seen through more than twenty prints on paper, a selection of transfer‑printed ceramics, and an eighteenth‑century maple dining table. Visitors will see a creamware jug by Josiah Wedgwood depicting "The Death of General Wolfe," prints by William Hogarth satirizing a threatened French invasion of England, and Charles Willson Peale's iconic portraits of George Washington and Benjamin Franklin. In the eighteenth century, printed images circulated widely to shape debates over democracy, sovereignty, and nationhood. Cartoons, portraits, and landscapes could elicit responses ranging from admiration to outrage and spur viewers to political action. Works produced on both sides of the issues demonstrate how Britons and Americans differed with one another, and among themselves, over imperial authority and colonial resistance. Defying Empire gathers a cross-section of transatlantic public voices engaging in Revolutionary politics including familiar figures such as George Washington, pro-American British politicians, as well as often-overlooked citizens such as politically active women.