Hattie Elizabeth Burdette
Hattie Elizabeth Burdette was an American painter known for her portraits, especially miniatures.
Born in Washington, D.C., Burdette was educated in local schools before taking artistic instruction with Harold MacDonald. She was among the charter members of the Washington Water Color Club at its founding in 1896, remaining a member and exhibiting with them nearly every year until 1926. She was also among the founders of the Society of Washington Artists, whose vice-president she was between 1926 and 1929; she also exhibited with the society for early every year between 1892 and 1932, receiving a prize in 1902. She was also a founding member of the Miniature Painters, Sculptors and Gravers Society of Washington, of which organization she served as president in 1933 and 1934. Her work appeared in the Greater Washington Independent Exhibition of 1935. A portrait of Mabel Boardman, owned by the American Red Cross, appeared in an exhibit at the National Gallery of Art in 1950. Burdette's best-known work is a portrait of George Washington as a Mason, painted for the George Washington Bicentennial Commission using items that Washington himself had used during his life. Actor Tefft Johnson served as a model for Washington. The painting was donated to the George Washington Masonic National Memorial by Sol Bloom as a memorial to his wife. Prints of the portrait were sold as souvenirs of the bicentennial. Three portrait miniatures by Burdette, depicting unknown women, are currently owned by the Smithsonian American Art Museum. Portraits by her of Charles Doolittle Walcott, James Smithson, Clifford K. Berryman, and Katherine Durfee Berryman are owned by the National Portrait Gallery. Her portrait of John Langdon is in the collection of the United States Capitol. Examples of her work may also be found at Washington and Lee University, the United States Department of the Navy, and the Western Reserve Historical Society. Burdette continued painting until about three years before her death, which occurred in the District of Columbia. She is buried at Congressional Cemetery.
