John Trumbull’s painting Declaration of Independence shows 42 of the 56 signers of the Declaration.
Trumbull’s large oil painting depicts the five-man drafting committee presenting the document to the Second Continental Congress. It was commissioned in 1817, purchased by Congress in 1819, and placed in the United States Capitol Rotunda in 1826. The scene is often casually called a signing scene, but it actually represents the presentation of the draft on June 28, 1776.
Trumbull originally hoped to include all 56 signers. He could not obtain identifiable likenesses for everyone, so fourteen signers do not appear. He also included several men who participated in Congress but did not sign the Declaration, making the total number of visible people different from the number of signers shown.
The painting is reproduced on the reverse of the U.S. two-dollar bill, though the bill’s engraving contains 42 figures from the composition. This artwork therefore combines a historical event with later portrait reconstruction rather than functioning as a literal photograph of one meeting.