The sitters both descended from very old Dutch families of New Jersey Isaack Van der Beek (by 1805 he spelled his name Isaac Vanderbeck) was born in Hackensack on October 29, 1743, and died in New York on May 27,1833. On November 27,1767, he married Rachel Ryerson of Saddle River. She was born on May 13, 1751, and died in New York on February 23, 1825. Their only child was a daughter, Ann. Isaac Van der Beek was active in the patriot militia during the Revolutionary War. In 1791 he was an elder of the Dutch Church in Hackensack and in 1805 president of the town’s board of trustees. The couple is listed in the New York census of 1810 but not the census of 1820, although their wills, hers in 1823 and his in 1833, describe them as residents of New York. Their estates consisted primarily of real estate in New York and Newburgh, New Jersey. The portraits have been attributed to several different artists. They were originally sold in 1918 and in the 1920s as by GILBERT STUART, with a statement of authenticity from Jonce I. McGurck. Lawrence Park felt they were by John Vanderlyn (1775-1852). William Sawitzky attributed them to James Frothingham (1786-1864). The staff of the Frick Art Reference Library and also Harold E. Dickson felt they were by John Wesley Jarvis. This last attribution seems to be the correct one, judging especially from the clarity of the spirited likenesses and the summary fashion in which the arms and hands are painted. According to family tradition, they were painted in 1807, which would have been about the time the couple moved to New York, but a relative fluency of technique suggests that Jarvis may have painted them as much as five years later.

Although the thirteen colonies that would constitute the United States of America were founded by several different nations, by 1763 (the end of the French and Indian Wars), the British controlled most of North America from the Atlantic Ocean to the Mississippi River. In many respects the American colonies functioned like an English province. Culturally they were largely British; from interior design and dress to painted portraits, wealthy colonists emulated the London fashions of the period. However, there was often a time lag, as examples of the finest British furniture, household goods, and decorative items such as paintings had to be transported across the ocean.

At first the only trained artists and artisans in the colonies were emigrants from London who thought fame would be easier to achieve in the less competitive atmosphere of Boston or Philadelphia. By the end of the eighteenth century, this traffic had reversed somewhat, as American artists went to London for their training. Portraits were the most popular genre, since British citizens everywhere wanted visual records of their families and heroes. Historical and literary subjects, such as those by Benjamin West, were usually only painted in London; their appreciation required a more educated audience than was the case with many colonists. The pervasive influence of Britain would continue to affect the development of culture in the United States long after the Revolutionary War had severed the Crown’s political authority.