Self-Portrait

Bust-length portrait of an elderly gentleman facing front, with white hair worn in bangs with side whiskers. He wears a black coat, black vest, white shirt, and high white neckband tied in a bow.

Marchant was a self-taught artist who began his career as a house painter. He worked mainly in oils, but a few miniatures by him are known. He established a portrait studio in Edgartown Massachusetts in the mid 1820s, but by late 1826 he traveled to Charleston and advertised his services there. After spending 1828-29 in Edgartown, the artist moved to Worcester, Massachusetts, where he maintained a "painting room" and painted some of city's most prominent personalities. After 1832 he worked in New York City, but continued to travel for work as for as Nashville, New Orleans and cities in Ohio. He exhibited regularly.