Raphaelle Peale

Primarily known as a still life painter, Raphaelle Peale is the son of artist, naturalist, and museum founder Charles Willson Peale. The elder Peale, like most art theorists of the era, considered still life painting to be a subject only worthy of amateurs. He preferred that his son paint portraits, which he sometimes did (as with the Museum's excellent portrait of Absalom Jones). Raphaelle perservered and is remembered as the nation's first professional still life painter.