Philadelphia Museum of Art - Information : Press Room : Press Releases : 1999

September 30th, 1999

Worldly Goods Catalogue Presents First-ever, Comprehensive Look at the Arts of Colonial Pennsylvania

From samplers and teapots to high chests and portraits, the decorative and fine arts of early Pennsylvania and its surrounding region are explored for the first time in Worldly Goods: The Arts of Early Pennsylvania, 1680-1758. A fully illustrated catalogue accompanying the exhibition of the same name (on view at the Philadelphia Museum of Art from October 10, 1999, to January 2, 2000), Worldly Goods surveys work in all mediums by the remarkably diverse artists and artisans of colonial Pennsylvania.

With primary essays and catalogue entries by exhibition organizer Jack L. Lindsey, Curator of American Decorative Arts at the Philadelphia Museum of Art, Worldly Goods also includes insightful contributions from leading authorities in American art, history, and culture: Richard S. Dunn, McNeil Center for Early American Studies, University of Pennsylvania; Edward C. Carter II, Librarian, American Philosophical Society; and Richard Saunders, Director, Middlebury College Museum of Art. Together, the essays delineate Pennsylvania's prominent contributions to the rapidly growing and surprisingly international cultural influence of colonial America.

The more than 500 objects in the Worldly Goods catalogue--each beautifully reproduced, often for the first time--bear ample witness to the astonishingly inventive styles and aesthetics of early Pennsylvania, and highlight the colony's striking advances in the arts, commerce, technology, scientific inquiry, and philosophy.

Worldly Goods: The Arts of Early Pennsylvania, 1680-1758 will be available for $65.00 hardbound, and $35.00 softbound, in the Museum Store, or by calling (215) 684-7962. Also available in the Museum Store: Philadelphia: Three Centuries of American Art, the encyclopedic and fully illustrated catalogue of the 1976 bicentennial exhibition held at the Philadelphia Museum of Art ($69.95 hardbound, and $42.00 softbound); and a complete handbook of the Museum's Pennsylvania German Collection, featuring photographs of 1,115 objects ($28.00 softbound).

Worldly Goods: The Arts of Early Pennsylvania, 1680-1758
Philadelphia Museum of Art
266 pp.
9 x 11 ½ inches
380 black and white illustrations
214 full color illustrations
Hardbound 0-87633-130-4
Softbound 0-87633-129-0

The Philadelphia Museum of Art is among the largest museums in the United States, with a collection of more than 227,000 works of art and more than 200 galleries presenting painting, sculpture, works on paper, photography, decorative arts, textiles, and architectural settings from Asia, Europe, Latin America, and the United States. Its facilities include its landmark Main Building on the Benjamin Franklin Parkway, the Perelman Building, located nearby on Pennsylvania Avenue, the Rodin Museum on the 2200 block of the Benjamin Franklin Parkway, and two 18th-century houses in Fairmount Park, Mount Pleasant and Cedar Grove. The Museum offers a wide variety of activities for public audiences, including special exhibitions, programs for children and families, lectures, concerts and films.

For additional information, contact the Marketing and Communications Department of the Philadelphia Museum of Art at (215) 684-7860. The Philadelphia Museum of Art is located on the Benjamin Franklin Parkway at 26th Street. For general information, call (215) 763-8100, or visit the Museum's website at www.philamuseum.org.