Portrait of Columbia "Miss Liberty"
circa 1805
watercolor on silk
unsigned, but likely attributed to the Abby Wright School, South Hadley Massachusetts
set in original frame with eglomise glass
21 1/2 x 17 1/2 inches.

This painting closely resembles examples of needlework pictures wrought in silk threads by students of Abby Wright's (1774-1842) school in South Hadley, 1803-1811. Five compositionally similar pictures from this school featuring the "Liberty and Cornucopia" motif are discussed in Betty Ring, Girlhood Embroidery: American Samplers & Pictorial Needlework, 1650-1850, vol. I (New York City, New York: A. A. Kopf, 1993), p. 161.

A similar example also executed in watercolor on silk is held by the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, D.C. (accession number 256396) and also attributed to the Abby Wright School in South Hadley, Massachusetts.