Advanced Search 
Portrait of Ann Arnold
Jersey Nanny
Portrait of Ann Arnold
John Greenwood (American, 1727–1792)
1748
Medium/Technique
Mezzotint
Dimensions
Sheet: 24.4 x 19.7 cm (9 5/8 x 7 3/4 in.)
Credit Line
Gift of Henry Lee Shattuck
Accession Number1971.715
NOT ON VIEW
CollectionsAmericas, Prints and Drawings
ClassificationsPrints
DescriptionGreenwood does not identify the subject of this striking portrait in the poem that accompanies his image, but an advertisement in the December 4, 1748, issue of the Boston Gazette provides a clue. The short notice reads: "Just Published in Mezetento and to be Sold by J. Buck, at the Spectacles in Queen street, the Effigies of Ann Arnold, who generally goes by the name of Jersey Nanny." The MFA's impression appears to be the only surviving example of this work, which has come down through the centuries in what may be its original frame.
Signed
In plate, below image, lower right: Greenwood
InscriptionsIn plate, below image: Nature her various skill displays / In thousand shapes, a thousand Ways; / Tho' one Form differs from another, / She's still of all the common Mother: / Then, Ladies, let not Pride resist her, / But own that NANNY is your Sister.
In plate, below image, lower left: Greenwood ad vivum pinxt. et fecit
In plate, below image, lower right: Printed by J Turner for J Buck & Sold by him at the Spectacles in Queen Street Boston
In plate, below image, lower left: Greenwood ad vivum pinxt. et fecit
In plate, below image, lower right: Printed by J Turner for J Buck & Sold by him at the Spectacles in Queen Street Boston
ProvenanceGoodspeed's Bookshop, Boston; before 1934, to Henry Lee Shattuck (Brookline, MA); 1971, gift of Henry Lee Shattuck to the MFA. (Accession Date: December 8, 1971)