Friday 13 September 2024

Joshua Reynolds - part 2

c1747-49 Self-Portrait
oil on canvas 63.5 x 74.3 cm
National Portrait Gallery, London

Sir Joshua Reynolds was the leading English portraitist of the 18th century. Through study of ancient and Italian Renaissance art, and of the work of Rembrandt, Rubens, and Van Dyck, he brought great variety and dignity to British portraiture. He was born at Plympton in Devon, the son of a headmaster and fellow of Balliol College, Oxford: a more educated background than that of most painters. 

He was apprenticed in 1740 to the fashionable London portraitist Thomas Hudson, who also trained Joseph Wright of Derby. He spent 1749-52 abroad, mainly in Italy, and set up practice in London shortly after his return. He soon established himself as the leading portrait painter, though he was never popular with George III. He was a key figure in the intellectual life of London, and a friend of Dr Johnson.

 When the Royal Academy was founded in 1768, Reynolds was elected its first President. Although believing that history painting was the noblest work of the painter, he had little opportunity to practise it, and his greatest works are his portraits. His paintings are not perfectly preserved due to faulty technique. The carmine reds have faded, leaving flesh-tones paler than intended, and the bitumen used in the blacks has tended to crack. The National Gallery, London

For more biographical details, and for earlier works see part 1 also.

This is part 2 of an 8-part series on the works of Sir Joshua Reynolds:

1756 Dr. John Reynolds (1671–1757)
oil on canvas (size not given)
Eton College, Windsor, UK
 

1756 Edward Cornwallis
oil on canvas (size not given)
Art Gallery of Nova Scotia

1756 Frances, Countess of Dartmouth
oil on canvas 127 x 102 cm
Museo Nacional Thyssen-Bornemisza, Madrid


1756 Francis Hayman R.A.

Francis Hayman RA (1708-1776) and Joshua Reynolds were both born in Devonshire and had been pupils of the fashionable portrait painter Thomas Hudson. By the 1740s Hayman was painting portraits and conversation pieces as well as decorating the supper boxes of the pleasure gardens at Vauxhall Gardens with large paintings of scenes from contemporary novels and Shakespeare's plays. Hayman also did much to promote English art by his involvement in the St. Martin's Lane Academy and as President of the Society of Artists. The Academy recognised his services by appointing him as its first Librarian in 1770.

Reynolds and Hayman knew each other well and although unfinished, this is a warmly observed portrait of a successful artist of a slightly older generation who was well-known as an easy-going, clubbable character and good committee-man.


1756 Francis Hayman R.A.
oil on canvas 76.2 x 63.5 cm
The Royal Academy, London

1756 Suzanna Beckford
oil on canvas 127 x 102.2 cm
Tate Gallery, London

c1756-57 Horace Walpole
oil on canvas 127.2 x 101.8 cm
National Portrait Gallery, London

1756-60 Portrait of an Ecclesiastic
oil on canvas 77 x 64 cm
Museo Del Prado, Madrid, Spain

c1756-60 James Macardell
oil on canvas 74.9 x 62.2 cm
National Portrait Gallery, London

c1756 called Hannah Lightfoot, Mrs Axford (1730-c.1759), "The Fair Quakeress"
oil on canvas 81.5 x 66.5 cm
National Trust, Knole, Kent, UK

c1756 Lucy Sneyd (Later Mrs Grove) (1748–1789)
oil on canvas 76.2 x 63.2 cm
The Holburne Museum, Bath, UK

c1756 Samuel Johnson
oil on canvas 127.6 x 101.6 cm
National Portrait Gallery, London

c1756 Sir William Chambers R.A.
oil on canvas 88.9 x 68.6 cm 
National Portrait Gallery, London

1757 Miss Elizabeth Ingram
oil on canvas 127 x 101.5 cm
Walker Art Gallery, Liverpool, UK

c1757-58 Colonel (later Major General) The Honourable John Barrington 

John Barrington was commissioned into the 3rd Foot Guards in 1739 and transferred to the Coldstream Guards in 1746. In 1756 he was promoted colonel and appointed aide-de-camp to George II. On the formation of the 64th Foot in 1758 during the Seven Years' War (1756–1763), Barrington became its colonel. In 1758 Colonel Barrington was appointed second-in-command to Major-General Peregrine Hopson in an expedition against the French West Indies. After failing to capture the island of Martinique, the expedition proceeded to Guadeloupe, the richest of the French islands. Following Hopson's sudden death on 27 February 1759, command devolved to Barrington. He inherited an army weakened by sickness and frustrated by inaction, while his fleet was diverted to other duties.

Knowing that he could not take the island by direct assault, Barrington shrewdly set up a blockade, cutting off its supplies and forcing it to capitulate on 1 May 1759.


c1757-58 Colonel (later Major General) The Honourable John Barrington (1722–1764)
oil on canvas 76.5 x 63.8 cm
National Army Museum, London

c1757-59 Mr. Sedgwick
oil on canvas 74.9 x 62.2 cm
Cincinnati Art Museum, Ohio

c1757 Miss Mary Pelham
oil on canvas 71.1 x 56.5 cm
Dallas Museum of Art, TX

1758 Annetta Coke
oil on canvas 75.5 x 62.8 cm
Corcoran Collection (William A. Clark Collection)
National Gallery of Art, Washington, DC

1758 Charles Lennox, 3rd Duke of Richmond
oil on canvas (size not given)
Goodwood Collection, Goodwood House, Sussex

1758 Lady Elizabeth Hamilton

Painted for the sitter's mother, Elizabeth, Duchess of Hamilton and Brandon (1734-1790)


1758 Lady Elizabeth Hamilton
oil on canvas 117 x 84 cm
National Gallery of Art, Washington, DC

1758 Miss Maria Elizabeth Boothby
oil on canvas 76.5 x 63.8 cm
Legion of Honor, Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco

c1758-60 William Augustus, Duke of Cumberland

Third son of George II. A lifelong soldier, described by Horace Walpole as 'proud and unforgiving, fond of war for its own sake'. His victory at Culloden in 1746 ended the Jacobite threat, but his severe treatment of the rebels earned him the nickname of "Butcher of Culloden."


1758 William Augustus, Duke of Cumberland
 oil on canvas 76.2 x 63.5 cm
National Galleries of Scotland, Edinburgh

c1758-60 William Augustus, Duke of Cumberland

Cumberland is wearing a blue army uniform, although he had actually resigned his commission after defeat and political embarrassment in Austria in 1757. It seems the portrait was intended for one of Cumberland's generals, who probably preferred to have his commander wearing uniform.


c1758-60 William Augustus, Duke of Cumberland
oil on canvas 74.9 x 62.2 cm
National Portrait Gallery, London

1758-59 Henry Yelverton, Third Earl of Essex
oil on canvas (size not given)
Museum of the Shenandoah Valley, Winchester, Virginia

c1758 Portrait of William Turner
oil on canvas 123.2 x 96.5 cm
Legion of Honor, Fine Arts Museums of San Francisco

c1758-61 Thomas Moreton Reynolds (1733–1785), 2nd Lord Ducie of Tortworth
oil on canvas 76.2 x 63.5 cm
National Museum Cardiff, Wales, UK

c1758-59 A Little Girl (possibly Lady Frances Scott, later Lady Douglas, 1750 - 1817)
oil on canvas 76 x 63 cm
Scottish National Portrait Gallery, Edingburgh, UK

c1758 The Hon. Mrs John Barrington
oil on canvas 76.2 x 63.5 cm
Gainsborough's House, Sudbury, Suffolk, UK

1759 Sarah Bradley of Wakefield, Mrs William Ingram
oil on canvas 90 x 69 cm
National Trust, Peckover House, Wisbech, UK

1759 Sir David Lindsay, 4th Bart of Evelick (about 1732 - 1797)
oil on canvas 7.2 x 63.4 cm
Scottish National Portrait Gallery, Edingburgh, UK

1759 The 4th Duke of Queensberry ('Old Q') as Earl of March
oil on canvas 91 x 67.5 cm
The Wallace Collection, London

1759-60 James Maitland, 7th Earl of Lauderdale
oil on canvas 239 x 148.5 cm
Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney, Australia

1760  Captain Adam Duncan, later Admiral Duncanand 1st Viscount of Camperdown, 1731 - 1804
oil on canvas 127 x 101 cm
Scottish National Portrait Gallery, Edingburgh, UK

1760 Edward Kinaston (d.1792)
oil on canvas 76 x 63.5 cm
National Trust, Erddig, Wrexham, UK

1760 Laurence Sterne
oil on canvas 127.3 x 100.3 cm
National Portrait Gallery, London

1760 Lord Ligonier
oil on canvas 281.2 x 235.7 cm
Tate Gallery, London

1760 Mrs. Robert Brudenell
oil on canvas 75.5 x 63.5 cm
Harvard Art Museums, MA

1760 Robert Dodsley
oil on canvas 75.8 x 63.5 cm
Dulwich Picture Gallery, London

1760-62 Portrait of a Boy
oil on canvas 54 x 43 cm
Private Collection

c1760 Anne, 2nd Countess of Albemarle

Lady Anne, 2nd Countess of Albemarle, is approaching 60 in this portrait. She is the widow of William-Anne Keppel, 2nd Earl of Albemarle, with whom she had 15 children, although only four sons and two daughters survived childhood. She holds a shuttle and is engaged in ‘knotting’ – a pastime involving making knots in thread which could then be sewn as decoration onto other items. A pair of scissors and a workbasket lie on the table beside her. Her face is almost dead-white because the paint has been bleached by the light.


c1760 Anne, 2nd Countess of Albemarle
oil on canvas 126.5 x 101 cm
The National Gallery, London

c1760 Elizabeth Gunning, Duchess of Hamilton and Argyll
oil on canvas 238.8 x 147.3 cm
Yale Center for British Art, New Haven, Connecticut

1760s An Officer on Horseback

Reynolds (1723-1792) captures a moment of stillness amid the chaos of battle. A soldier, dressed for battle, rears his horse. In the distance, plumes of smoke reach towards the sky, alerting the viewer to the danger. This study for an equestrian portrait was the third composition Reynolds painted onto the same piece of canvas. Two abandoned portraits are visible in the X-ray of the painting – one of a young boy above the horse’s mane, the other an older man, now upside down, just below. The picture remained in Reynolds’ possession and was acquired by the painter and founder of Dulwich Picture Gallery, Francis Bourgeois (1753-1811), at the Reynolds studio sale of 1796.

1760s An Officer on Horseback
oil on canvas 77.3 x 64.5 cm
Dulwich Picture Gallery, London

Wednesday 11 September 2024

Joshua Reynolds - part 1



c1740 Self-portrait (age 17)
black and white chalk and stump, on buff laid paper 41.5 x 26 cm

Reynolds was born in Plympton in Devonshire on 16 July 1723, seventh child in the large family of the Reverend Samuel Reynolds and Theophilia Potter. Inspired to become an artist by Jonathan Richardson's elevated Essay on the Theory of Painting, Reynolds was apprenticed in 1740 to Thomas Hudson, the most fashionable portraitist of the day, with whom he remained until 1743.

After two years of independent practice in London and another two in his native Devonshire, Reynolds was introduced by his father's friend Lord Edgcumbe to Commodore Augustus Keppel, about to sail to the Mediterranean, who invited him to join his expedition. After a stay in Minorca he spent over two years in Rome, from 1750 to 1752, returning through Florence, Venice and northern Italy, Lyons, and Paris. He brought back with him Giuseppe Marchi, whom he employed as an assistant until the end of his life. Although he never received any academic training, this experience of Italy, his reverence for Raphael, Michelangelo, and the Venetians, and the notebooks that he filled with drawings from classical antiquity and from the Old Masters were the foundation of his ideals and practice as a painter.

Armed with introductions from Lord Edgcumbe to aristocratic sitters, and immediately establishing his reputation in London with his masterly and dramatic full length portrait of Keppel in the pose of the Apollo Belvedere, Reynolds soon supplanted Hudson as the capital's leading portraitist, his only serious competitor being Ramsay. In 1759 he had more than 150 sitters; the following year he bought a grand house on Leicester Fields, took on pupils, and ran a coach. He never married; his household was run first by his sister Frances, then by his niece, Mary Palmer.

The press of business was so great, especially in the middle years of his career, that, as had been customary with a busy portraitist since the time of Lely, the drapery and subordinate parts of his portraits were usually largely executed by assistants--at first by Peter Toms, and later by his own pupils. He employed the finest engravers to publish his principal compositions in mezzotint, a medium in which British eighteenth-century printmakers excelled. He also contributed regularly to the exhibitions first of the Society of Artists, then of the Royal Academy. Though he was uninterested in politics and no courtier, his eminence was such that it was inevitably he who was appointed first president of the Royal Academy of Arts in 1768. He was then knighted.

In 1781 Reynolds visited Flanders and Holland, where he was greatly impressed by the work of Rubens. In 1784 he was appointed principal portrait painter to the king in succession to Ramsay. The following year he was commissioned by Catherine II of Russia to paint an historical picture of his own choosing; The Infant Hercules was his largest and most ambitious work. Apart from experiencing chronic deafness he had always enjoyed vigorous good health until he suffered a stroke in 1782; in 1789 he lost the sight of his left eye, and on 23 February 1792 he died in his home on Leicester Fields. He was given a quasi-state funeral and was buried in Saint Paul's Cathedral.

National Gallery of Art, Washington, DC


This is part 1 of an 8-part series on the works of Sir Joshua Reynolds:

1740-49 Called "Johann Christoph Pepusch (1667–1752)"
oil on canvas 74 x 62 cm
Royal College of Music, London

1743 John Richard Edgcumbe, 2nd Baron Mount Edgcumbe (1716–1761)
oil on canvas 123 x 99.5 cm
Mount Edgcumbe House, Torpoint, UK

1746 Richard Eliot and Family
oil on canvas 85.3 x 111.8 cm
Port Eliot, Saltash, UK

1746 Richard Eliot and Family 
detail

1746 Richard Eliot and Family 
detail

1746 Self Portrait
oil on canvas 104 x 90 cm
The Box, Plymouth, UK

1746-47 Lieutenant Robert Haswell, RN
(son of John Haswell of Tiverton, Devon)
oil on canvas 46 x 36 cm
The New Art Gallery Walsall, UK

c1746 Portrait of a Young Man
oil o canvas 34.3 x 24.1 cm
The Barber Institute of Fine Arts, Birmingham, UK

1747 Commander John Roberts (1720–1815)
oil on canvas 76 x 63.5 cm
National Maritime Museum, London


c1747-49 Self Portrait
oil on canvas  63.5 x 74.3 cm
National Portrait Gallery, London, London

1748 Portrait of a Gentleman
oil on canvas 76 x 63,5 cm
English Heritage, Marble Hill House, Twickenham, London

1748 Thomas (1740–1825) and Martha Neate (1741–after 1795) with His Tutor, Thomas Needham
oil on canvas 168 x 180.3 cm
The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York

c1748-49 The Reverend William Beele (1704–1757)
oil on canvas 76.2 x 63.5 cm
The Barber Institute of Fine Arts, Birmingham, UK

c1748 Admiral Paul Henry Ourry (1719–1783), MP, with 'Jersey'
oil on canvas 127 x 101.5 cm
National Trust, Saltram, Plymouth, UK

c1748 Admiral the Honourable John Byron (1723–1786)
oil on canvas 123.5 x 98 cm
Newstead Abbey, Ravenshead, UK

c1748 Elizabeth Hamar, née Limeburner (1731–1760)
 oil on canvas 127.1 x 101.8 cm
The Box, Plymouth, UK

c1748 Portrait of an Unknown Man
oil on canvas 76.2 x 63.5 cm
Yale Center for British Art, New Haven, CT

1749 Commodore the Honourable Augustus Keppel 

This portrait was probably painted at Port Mahon, Minorca, when Reynolds accompanied Keppel to the Mediterranean on a mission to negotiate against the depredations of Barbary corsairs. Lord Edgcumbe had introduced Reynolds to Keppel in early 1749 and on 11 May the painter sailed with him from Plymouth for Minorca. He spent the rest of the year there, painting portraits of the British garrison. This was the first of many portraits of Keppel painted by Reynolds and marked the beginning of a close lifelong friendship between them:


1749 Commodore the Honourable Augustus Keppel
oil on canvas 127 x 101.5
National Maritime Museum, Royal Museums Greenwich, London

1749-60 Virgin and Child with Infant Saint John the Baptist
oil on canvas 82 x 67 cm
Government Art Collection, London

c1749 Portrait of a Naval Lieutenant

A three-quarter-length portrait to right in lieutenant's undress uniform, 1748–1767, with a gold-laced hat. The sitter wears his own hair and has a telescope in his right hand and crooked in his arm. He stands against a background of rock and foliage and in the right distance is a two-decker. The portrait was probably painted at Port Mahon in 1749, where Reynolds painted portraits of the British garrison.


c1749 Portrait of a Naval Lieutenant
oil on canvas 124.5 x 101 cm
National Maritime Museum, London



1750-52 Diana (leaf in Italian Sketch Book)
 graphite on paper 18.8 x 13 cm
The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York

c1750 Self-portrait
oil on canvas 63.5 x 47.6 cm
Yale Center for British Art, New Haven, Connecticut

c1750 Sir Peter Byrne Leicester (1732–1770), Bt
oil on canvas 73.7 x 61 cm
Tabley House, Knutsford, UK

1752 Joseph Wilton
oil on canvas 76.2 x 59.7 cm
National Portrait Gallery,  London

1752-53 Captain the Honourable Augustus Keppel, 1725–1786
oil on canvas 239 x 147.5 cm
National Maritime Museum, London

1752-56 Catherine Moore
oil on canvas 69.8 x 57.1 cm
English Heritage, Kenwood, London

1752-64 Thomas Lister (The Brown Boy)
oil on canvas 231 x 147.5 cm
Cartwright Hall Art Gallery, Bradford, UK

c1752 Madonna and Child with Two Angels
black chalk on ivory laid paper 14.5 x 18.9 cm
Art Institute of Chicago, IL


1753-54 Henry Vansittart
oil on canvas 73.7 x 60.3 cm
The Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge, UK

c1753-54 possibly Elizabeth Hamilton, Mrs John Cameron of Glenkindy, Later the Comtesse de Fay
oil on canvas 76 x 63.5 cm
National Trust, Montacute House, Somerset, UK

c1753-55 Charles, 9th Lord Cathcart 

He wears a grey, curled wig tied with a ribbon and has on his right cheekbone a black silk lunette patch, to cover a scar received at the battle of Fontenoy in Flanders during the Wars of the Austrian Succession. He wears a red coat with black lapels, decorated with gold braid trimming, and a sash across his body from his left shoulder. Round the wrist of his extended hand is a white lace ruff. His glittering breastplate can just be seen beneath his coat:


c1753-55 Charles, 9th Lord Cathcart
oil on canvas 124 x 99 cm
Manchester Art Gallery, UK

1753-58 Self-Portrait
oil on canvas 73.7 x 61.6 cm
Tate Gallery, London

1754 Thomas Middleton Trollope of Casewick (1721–1779)
oil on canvas 76 x 62 cm
Usher Gallery, Lincoln, UK

1755 Portrait of a Lady
oil on canvas 60 x 45 cm
Private Collection

1755-56 Francis Beckford
oil on canvas 128.3 x 101.6 cm
Tate Gallery, London

1755-57 Admiral Francis Holburne

This portrait was started after May 1755 and was initially intended to be head and shoulders of Holburne alone. In 1757 the canvas was extended on the left and bottom to include the child, Holburne’s only son. The portrait was fitted around Holburne's naval commitments: in 1755 he went with reinforcements to America, with Boscawen and Loudon, and two years later sat on Byng's court-martial. He was for eight years Commander-in-Chief at Portsmouth, was made Rear-Admiral of England in 1770 and was briefly Governor of Greenwich Hospital in 1771. He was MP for Plymouth, 1768–1771. The Holburne family had significant connections. The Admiral was second son of Sir James Holburne of Menstrie: his elder brother James (d.1758), became second baronet:


1755-57 Admiral Francis Holburne (1704–1771), and his Son, Sir Francis (1752–1820), 4th Baronet
oil on canvas 128 x 102.7 cm
National Maritime Museum, London

1755-57 Charles Fitzroy (1683–1757), 2nd Duke of Grafton
oil on canvas 236 x 145 cm
Examination Schools, University of Oxford, UK

c1755-60 Mrs. Chalmers
oil on canvas 76.8 x 63.5 cm
Detroit Institute of Art, MI

c1755-77 General John Guise (1682/1683–1765)
oil on canvas 76.2 x 62.8 cm
Christ Church, University of Oxford, UK

c1755 Edward Boscawen

Edward Boscawen joined the Navy at the age of fifteen, and his talent as an officer meant he was soon promoted. He took great care over the wellbeing of his men, but would not accept incompetence; his aggression in battle earned him the nickname 'Old Dreadnaught'. He also had a parliamentary career, representing Truro in Cornwall from 1742:


c1755 Edward Boscawen
oil on canvas 76.2 x 63.5 cm
National Portrait Gallery, London

c1755 Field Marshal Jean Louis Ligonier (Later Lord Ligonier) (1680–1770)
oil on canvas 127 x 101.6 cm
National Army Museum, London

c1755 Mary Barnardiston (1730–1760)
oil on canvas 76.8 x 63.2 cm
V&A Museum, London

n.d. Mary Barnardiston (1730–1760)
oil on canvas 73 x 62 cm

1756 Captain Robert Orme
oil on canvas 239 x 147 cm
The National Gallery, London