{"product_id":"a-deaf-artist-in-early-america-the-worlds-of-john-brewster-jr-9780807066164","title":"A Deaf Artist in Early America: The Worlds of John Brewster Jr.","description":"\u003cp\u003eJohn Brewster Jr. (1766-1854) was one of the most prominent early American portrait painters. His hauntingly beautiful portraits have a directness and intensity of vision that were rarely equaled  as the images in this book attest.  Brewsters portraits have sold astonishingly well at auction  and his work is featured in the collections of prestigious museums  yet curiously little has been written about the life of this deaf artist. Traveling the New England coast to paint the portraits of the merchant class that arose after the Revolution  he lived precisely when a Deaf-World-with its own language  social institutions  and culture-was forming. Harlan Lane  award-winning historian of the Deaf  argues that deaf people are often visually gifted  and that Brewster  as a deaf artist  is part of a long and continuing distinguished tradition.  Lanes unprecedented biography both vividly and comprehensively explores Brewsters worlds: he was a seventh-generation descendant of William Brewster  who led the Pilgrims on the Mayflower voyage; he was a member of the Federalist elite; a Deaf man; and  finally  an artist.  In 1817  at the age of fifty-one  Brewster attended the first school for the Deaf in America  the Connecticut Asylum for the Education and Instruction of Deaf \u0026amp; Dumb Persons. Its extraordinary to imagine that this was the first time he experienced fluent conversation and real social and intellectual exchange. Yet  as Lane notes  Brewsters ambivalence about this minority reflects the difficult choices confronting many Deaf people  then and now.  Including little-known information on the French roots of the American Deaf-World; the Deaf communities of Marthas Vineyard  Maine  and New Hampshire in the nineteenth century; and on contemporary Deaf art  A Deaf Artist in Early America provides a multifaceted glimpse of Brewster  New England history  and the distinctive culture  language  and social institutions of the Deaf in America.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"My Store","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":45651930710069,"sku":"ByrdShop_0807066168","price":36.69,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0627\/8139\/0901\/files\/9780807066164.jpg?v=1781845791","url":"https:\/\/atxbooks.com\/products\/a-deaf-artist-in-early-america-the-worlds-of-john-brewster-jr-9780807066164","provider":"ATX Books","version":"1.0","type":"link"}