Skip to main contentBiographyGeorge Peter Alexander (or P. A.) Healey was born in 1813 to an Irish father and American mother. He grew up in Boston and, after his father’s death, sold drawings to help support his family. When he was a teenager, he opened his own portrait studio. Though he did not receive many commissions at first, he was encouraged to continue painting and eventually gained the attention of Mrs. Harrison Gray Otis, a Boston socialite who commissioned him to paint her portrait and subsequently recommended him to her friends.
In 1834, Healey moved to France to study painting. In the subsequent years, he would travel Europe to study art in Italy, and became a member of the elite social scene in England; this is where he met his wife, Louisa Phillips, with whom he settled in Paris shortly thereafter. His career was successful in Paris: he received hundreds of portrait commissions, among which included Pope Pius IX, Abraham Lincoln, Daniel Webster, Henry Clay, John Calhoun, William H. Seward, Franz Liszt, and Queen Elizabeth of Romania. His work was shown at the Paris Salon in 1840, and he became an Honorary Academian at the National Academy of Design in 1843. He was also hired to paint portraits of every United States president from John Quincy Adams to Ulysses Grant. Perhaps most impressively, he was the first American artist to be invited to hang his work in the self-portrait gallery at the Galleria degli Uffizi in Florence. Though he spent much of his life in Europe, he moved to Chicago in the 1840s and remained there until 1869, when he moved back to Europe, working mostly in Rome and Paris. He returned to Chicago in 1892, and remained there until his death two years later.
George Healy mainly painted portraits, though he would paint the occasional history scene; these are so uncommon, however, that we might consider them an anomaly--he was first and foremost a portraitist, known for his accuracy and detail. He was immensely popular in the United States and Europe during his lifetime, and his work is still displayed in museums, including the National Gallery of Art, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, and the Art Institute of Chicago.
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for George Peter Alexander Healey
George Peter Alexander Healey
American, 1813 - 1894
In 1834, Healey moved to France to study painting. In the subsequent years, he would travel Europe to study art in Italy, and became a member of the elite social scene in England; this is where he met his wife, Louisa Phillips, with whom he settled in Paris shortly thereafter. His career was successful in Paris: he received hundreds of portrait commissions, among which included Pope Pius IX, Abraham Lincoln, Daniel Webster, Henry Clay, John Calhoun, William H. Seward, Franz Liszt, and Queen Elizabeth of Romania. His work was shown at the Paris Salon in 1840, and he became an Honorary Academian at the National Academy of Design in 1843. He was also hired to paint portraits of every United States president from John Quincy Adams to Ulysses Grant. Perhaps most impressively, he was the first American artist to be invited to hang his work in the self-portrait gallery at the Galleria degli Uffizi in Florence. Though he spent much of his life in Europe, he moved to Chicago in the 1840s and remained there until 1869, when he moved back to Europe, working mostly in Rome and Paris. He returned to Chicago in 1892, and remained there until his death two years later.
George Healy mainly painted portraits, though he would paint the occasional history scene; these are so uncommon, however, that we might consider them an anomaly--he was first and foremost a portraitist, known for his accuracy and detail. He was immensely popular in the United States and Europe during his lifetime, and his work is still displayed in museums, including the National Gallery of Art, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, and the Art Institute of Chicago.
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