Scarce mezzotint engraving of George Washington created and signed in pencil by S. Arlent Edwards.
The portrait shows George Washington, with the monogrammed with "SAE" and the date 1900 in the lower-right corner of the engraving. A rosette lies just below the engraving in the margin next to Arlent's signature in pencil. This mezzotint was copied from an original painting by Edward Savage from 1793, and was published by Joseph F. Sabin in New York.
Born in England in 1862, S. Arlent Edwards studied art and architecture before becoming known for his mezzotint reproductions of well-known paintings. He moved to New York in 1890 to become a book illustrator and began to revive the art of single-print mezzotint engravings in color which had not been in use since the late eighteenth century. Edwards was known for inking and printing the plates on his own, and then only printing a limited number of copies before destroying each plate. This set of prints includes portraits of George Washington and General Nathanael Greene.