Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness draws upon the collections of American paintings, decorative arts, and prints at the Yale University Art Gallery to illuminate the subtle and multivalent nature of the American experience from the time of the settlements of the late seventeenth century to the World’s Columbian Exposition in 1893. Included in this exhibition of more than two hundred works are treasures rarely seen outside of New Haven, such as John Trumbull’s eight Revolutionary War scenes, including The Declaration of Independence (which have never before left the campus as a group), Winslow Homer’s The Morning Bell, and Jeremiah Dummer’s magnificent silver candlesticks—the earliest surviving pair of American sticks. The works tell the story of their times, creating a vivid portrait of a young country struggling to invent a people and a nation, and to define itself culturally, politically, and geographically.

Exhibition and publication organized by Helen Cooper, the Holcombe T. Green Curator of American Paintings and Sculpture; Patricia Kane, the Friends of American Arts Curator of American Decorative Arts; and Elisabeth Hodermarsky, Associate Curator of Prints, Drawings, and Photographs. Image: John Trumbull, The Declaration of Independence, July 4, 1776, 1786–1820. Oil on canvas. Yale University Art Gallery, Trumbull Collection