JEREMIAH THEUS

Portrait painter Jeremiah Theus was born in 1719 in Canton Grison, Switzerland. When he was about 16 years old, Theus immigrated to Charlestown, South Carolina with his parents. By 1840, he had established himself as a portrait painter, earning commissions from the Charlestown elite, who were mostly wealthy merchant and plantation families.
Theus’s style reflects a Rococo sensibility in his bright, crisp coloring and attention to the details of his sitters’ fashionable clothing.
Jeremiah Theus died in Charlestown in 1774.