Museum deaccessions usually appear at auctions, and museums rarely just give a work of art to another museum. The Independence Seaport Museum in Philadelphia did just that. Portrait of Miss Adèle Sigoigne, painted around 1815 by Bass Otis, commissioned by Adèle Sigoigne’s friends Jane and Nicholas Biddle, has been on view at Andalusia Historic House, Gardens & Arboretum in Bensalem, Pennsylvania, since 2014 as a long-term loan from the Independence Seaport Museum. Now it is in Andalusia’s permanent collection.
Instead of being shown on an easel in the library, the portrait will be hung permanently in what is referred to as the Painted Floor Bedroom, in the part of the house built in 1797 where Adèle stayed when she visited her friends Jane and Nicholas Biddle around the time Otis painted her portrait and that of her friend Jane Craig Biddle.
Although it is unclear how or when Jane and Adèle met, their lasting friendship is certain. Close in age and of similar social standing, the two women came from different backgrounds. Jane was a Philadelphian by birth, the only daughter of John and Margaret Craig, the couple who established Andalusia as a country estate in 1795. Adèle was French-born and had lived in Haiti. After the Haitian Revolution began in 1791, she moved to Philadelphia with her mother, Aimée Sigoigne, who started a school for young women at 128 Pine Street. The two women became friends, and Adèle was one of a few guests who attended Jane’s wedding to Nicholas Biddle, held at Andalusia October 3, 1811. The Biddles’ three daughters, including their daughter Adèle, who was named after her mother’s dear friend, later attended Madame Sigoigne’s school.
According to Andalusia’s executive director, John Vick, although the portrait is unsigned, its attribution is firm; it is nearly certain that the Biddles commissioned Bass Otis to paint Adèle’s portrait when he was painting Jane’s portrait around 1815. Jane’s portrait is now in the collection of the Second Bank of the United States Portrait Gallery in Philadelphia, which is a part of the National Park Service, along with the portrait of her husband, Nicholas Biddle, by Rembrandt Peale. Both women wear fashionable white Empire dresses with fabric draped over their shoulders: Jane’s drapery is white and sheer while Adèle’s is a vibrant red silk. Their hair is also similarly styled in an updo with ringlets framing their faces. Nicholas Biddle expressed his appreciation of Adèle’s portrait in a letter to Otis, which came with the painting from Independence Seaport Museum.
The Biddles’ patronage of Bass Otis continued for many years. In 1827 Nicholas Biddle commissioned the artist to paint a copy of Jacques-Louis David’s famous picture Napoleon Crossing the Alps (1801), which is also on view at Andalusia. It was once owned by Napoleon’s brother Joseph Bonaparte, who lived near the Biddles in Philadelphia and owned a country estate, Point Breeze, on the Delaware River near Andalusia.
By the 1820s, the Biddles began to patronize another Philadelphia artist, Thomas Sully, who in 1826 painted their portraits, both of which are on view at Andalusia. In 1829 the Biddles commissioned Sully to paint another portrait of Adèle Sigoigne, which is in the collection of The Huntington Library, Art Museum and Botanical Gardens in San Marino, California.
Visitors of Andalusia can see these paintings on a tour of the Historic House and Gardens. Guided tours are available Mondays, Tuesdays, and Fridays, as well as during select Saturdays from April to November. Tours are $30 per person (free for members and for children 12 and under) and can be reserved online (www.andalusiapa.org).
Independence Seaport Museum’s president and chief executive officer, Peter S. Seibert, said, “Our collections committee was unanimous in wanting to transfer the painting, which is relevant to Andalusia’s story. Adèle was practically family to the Biddles.” Seibert confessed that he is not sure why the Independence Seaport Museum once thought Adèle had a role in the city’s maritime history and bought the painting. “I think museums should transfer works that will remain in storage to museums that can use them to tell their story,” he said.
Originally published in the September 2024 issue of Maine Antique Digest. © 2024 Maine Antique Digest
