Friday 20 September 2024

Joshua Reynolds - part 5

c1775 Self-Portrait
oil on canvas 73.7 x 61 cm
Tate 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 see part 1, and for earlier works see parts 1 - 4 also.

This is part 5 of an 8-part series on the works of Sir Joshua Reynolds: 

1775 Miss Fleming as Aurora
later Jane Stanhope, Countess of Harrington
oil on canvas (size not given)
Harewood House, Harewood, Yorkshire, UK

c1778-79 Jane Fleming
later Countess of Harrington
oil on canvas 239.4 x 147.5 cm
The Huntington Library, Art Museum and Botanical Gardens,
San Marino, CA

1775 Lady Louisa Conolly
oil on canvas 136.5 x 99.7 cm
Harvard Art Museums, MA

1775 Samuel Johnson ("Blinking Sam")
oil on canvas 76 x 63 cm
The Huntington Library, Art Museum, and Botanical Gardens.
 San Marino, CA

1775-76 Miss Jane Bowles
oil on canvas 91 x 70.9 cm
The Wallace Collection, London

c1775-76 Georgiana (Spencer) Cavendish, Duchess of Devonshire
oil on canvas 239.4 x 147.5 cm
The Huntington Library, Art Museum and Botanical Gardens,
San Marino, CA

c1775-82 Girl Leaning on a Pedestal
(The Laughing Girl)
oil on canvas 91.5 x 71.2 cm
English Heritage, Kenwood House, London

c1775 Henry Loftus (1709–1783), 1st Earl of Ely, and his wife Frances Monroe (d.1821), Countess of Ely
 oil on canvas 241.5 x 181.5 cm
National Trust, Upton House near Banbury, UK

c1775 Master Crewe as Henry VIII
oil on canvas 139 x 111 cm
Tate Gallery, London

c1775 Miss Crewe
oil on canvas 137 x 112 cm
Tate Gallery, London

c1775 Mrs Elizabeth Carnac
oil on canvas 240.4 x 146.4 cm
The Wallace Collection, London

c1775 Self-Portrait 

This is one of Reynolds's most explicit attempts to rival Rembrandt as a self-portraitist. By the time he painted this work, he was the most famous artist in Britain and President of the Royal Academy of Arts. In his lectures at the Academy, Reynolds elaborated a theory of art based around the need for modern British artists to copy the Old Masters. In this picture, his costume, his pose, and the dramatic contrasts of light and dark all refer to the work of Rembrandt. Even the shape of his face is made to resemble the Dutch artist's distinctive, jowly features.


c1775 Self-Portrait
oil on canvas 73,7 x 61 cm
Tate Gallery, London

before 1776 The Calling of Samuel
oil on canvas 76.3 x 68.9 cm
 Dulwich Picture Gallery, London

1776 Lady Worsley
oil on canvas 236 x 144 cm
Harewood House, Leeds, UK

1776 Portrait of Omai

A South Sea Islander who travelled to England with the second expedition of captain Cook. 


1776 Portrait of Omai
oil on canvas 236 x 145.5 cm
National Portrait Gallery, London

1776-77 Lady Bampfylde
oil on canvas 238.1 x 148 cm
Tate Gallery, London

c1776 The Infant Samuel
oil on canvas 91.4 x 71.4 cm
Tate Gallery, London

c1776 Venus Chiding Cupid for Learning to Cast Accounts
oil on canvas 128 x 101.5 cm
Lady Lever Art Gallery, Wirral, UK

before 1777 The Banished Lord
oil on canvas 75.6 x 62.2 cm
Tate Gallery, London

before 1777 Sir Walter Blackett (1707–1777), Bt, MP for Newcastle upon Tyne (1734–1777)
oil on canvas 232 x 145 cm
The Royal Victoria Infirmary, Newcastle upon Tyne, UK

1777 Lieutenant Francis Reynolds in a naval uniform
oil on canvas 76.2 x 63.5 cm
(Location not found)

1777 Miss Elizabeth Beauclerc as Una with the Lion and Donkey
oil on canvas 76.2 x 63.5 cm
 Harvard Art Museums, MA

1777 Mrs. Elisha Mathew
oil on canvas 237.5 x 146.3 cm
The Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, Texas

1777 Mrs. Jelf Powis and her daughter
oil on canvas 236.2 x 144.8 cm
The Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, Texas

1777 Saint John the Baptist in the Wilderness
oil on canvas 132 x 102.2 cm
The Wallace Collection, London

1777 Sarah Campbell
oil on canvas 127.6 x 101.6 cm
Yale Center for British Art, New Haven, CT

1777 Sir William Hamilton
oil on canvas 255.3 x 175.2 cm
National Portrait Gallery, London

1777 William Markham (1719–1807), Archbishop of York
oil on canvas 141 x 111.8 cm
Christ Church, University of Oxford, UK

1777-78 The Hon. Miss Monckton

The Honourable Mary Monckton (1746-1840) was the youngest child and only surviving daughter of John Monckton, first Viscount Galway (1695-1751), and his second wife Jane. Until her marriage in 1786 to Edmund Boyle, 8th Earl of Corke (1742-98), Mary lived with her widowed mother in Charles Street, Berkeley Square, London. Well read and versed in the arts, she was regarded as among the most engaging of the capital's 'blue-stockings' (society women renowned for their literary prowess and social skills). Her parties were celebrated for their informal atmosphere, regular guests including the author Samuel Johnson (1709-84), the Whig politician Edmund Burke (1729-97), and the great tragic actress Sarah Siddons (1755-1831).


1777-78 The Hon. Miss Monckton
oil on canvas 240 x 149.3 cm T
ate Gallery, London

c1777-78 The Fourth Duke of Marlborough and his family
oil on canvas 318 x 289 cm
Blenheim Palace, Woodstock, Oxfordshire, UK

c1777 Sketch for ‘The 4th Duke of Marlborough and his Family’
oil on canvas 55.2 x 50.8 cm
Tate Gallery, London

1777-79 Lady Elizabeth Delmé and Her Children
oil on canvas 238.4 x 147.2 cm
National Gallery of Art, Washington, DC

c1777-80 John Musters
oil on canvas 238.5 x 147.3 cm
National Gallery of Art, Washington, DC

1778 Jane Fleming (1755-1824)
oil on canvas 235.6 x 145 cm
The Huntington Library, Art Museum and Botanical Gardens, San Marino, CA

1778 Lady Caroline Howard
oil on canvas 143 x 113 cm
National Gallery of Art, Washington, DC

c1778 Edmond Malone
oil on canvas 74.9 x 62.2 cm
National Portrait Gallery, London

c1778 Mr Huddesford and Mr Bampfylde
oil on canvas 125.1 x 130.2 cm
Tate Gallery, London

1779 Augustus Keppel, Viscount Keppel
oil on canvas 123.2 x 100.3 cm
National Portrait Gallery, London

1779 Lady Louisa Manners
oil on canvas 238.8 x 144.8 cm
English Heritage, Kenwood, London

Wednesday 18 September 2024

Joshua Reynolds - part 4

c1775 Self-Portrait as a Deaf Man 
oil on canvas 75.9 x 63.4 cm
Tate 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 see part 1, and for earlier works see parts 1 -3 also.

This is part 4 of an 8-part series on the works of Sir Joshua Reynolds:

1767-74 John Manners (1721–1770), Marquess of Granby
oil on canvas 245 x 207 cm
Trinity College, University of Cambridge, UK

before1768 Charles Smith (1688–1768), Merchant and Banker
oil on canvas 76.2 x 63.5 cm
City Art Centre, Edinburgh, UK

1768 George Capel, Viscount Malden (1757–1839), and Lady Elizabeth Capel (1755–1834)
oil on canvas 181.6 x 145.4 cm
The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York

1768 Sir Jeffrey Amherst
oil on canvas 74 x 62.2 cm
National Gallery of Canada, Ottowa, ON

c1768-69 Recovery from Sickness, an Allegory
oil on canvas 70.8 x 91.1 cm
Dulwich Picture Gallery, London

c1768-69 Sir Watkin Williams-Wynn and his Mother: Sir Watkin Williams-Wynn was a hugely wealthy Welsh landowner, and a member of the ‘Honourable and Loyal Society of Ancient Britons’. Reynolds shows him with his mother. In the background is the Welsh fortress of Dinas Bran, associated with the Welsh kingdom before the English conquest in the thirteenth century. Williams-Wynn commissioned two paintings of the same view from the landscape painter Richard Wilson. Sir Watkin was proud of his descent from the ancient British and Welsh kings, but he was also a sophisticated London gentleman with a grand house in the West End designed by the architect Robert Adam.

c1768-69 Sir Watkin Williams-Wynn and his Mother
oil on canvas 238.1 x 181,6 cm
Tate Gallery, London

1769 Captain Philemon Pownall
oil on canvas 239 x 148 cm
Neue Pinakothek, Munich, Germany

1769 Colonel Acland and Lord Sydney: This large double portrait depicts on a life-size scale two young aristocrats, Dudley Alexander Sydney Cosby, Lord Sydney (1732–1774), shown on the left, and Colonel John Dyke Acland (1746-1778) leaping forward on the right. Dressed in quasi-historical clothing invented by the artist, they are mimicking a medieval or Renaissance hunt; the dead game they leave in their trail underlining their noble blood and aristocratic right to hunt. The painting celebrates the men’s friendship by linking it to an imaginary chivalric past, when young lords pursued ‘manly’ activities together against a backdrop of ancient forest. The two subjects run and take aim in perfect rhythmic harmony; at one with each other and joint masters over nature.


                
1769 Colonel Acland and Lord Sydney: The Archers
oil on canvas 236 x 180 cm
Tate Gallery, London

1769 Frederick Howard, 5th Earl of Carlisle
oil on canvas 240 x 147.5 cm
Tate Gallery, London

1769 John Hope, 1739 - 1785
oil on canvas 76.2 x 63.5 cm
Scottish National Portrait Gallery, Edingburgh, UK

1769 or later Elizabeth Kerr (1745-1780), marchioness of Lothian
oil on canvas 87.5 x 74.9 cm
Museo Soumaya at Plaza Carso, Mexico City

1770-71 Richard Peers Symons, M.P. (Later Sr Richard Peers Symons, Baronet)
oil on canvas 237.5 x 146.1 cm
Cincinnati Art Museum, Ohio

1770-76 The Calling of Samuel
oil on canvas 36 x 29 cm
The National Trust, Knole, Kent, UK

1770-80 Colonel John Hayes St. Leger
oil on canvas 236 x 146 cm
National Trust, Waddesdon Manor, Aylesbury Vale, UK

c1770 Crying Forfeits
oil on canvas 127.6 x 102.2 cm
Detroit Institute of Art, MI

c1770 Doctor Johnson Arguing
oil on canvas 75.6 x 62.9 cm
Tate Gallery, London

c1770 Oliver Goldsmith (1728–1774)
 oil on canvas 75 x 62 cm
National Trust, Knole, Sevenoaks, UK

1770s The Young Shepherdess
oil on canvas 128 x 103 cm
English Heritage, Kenwood, London

1771 Lady ‘Harriot’ Christian Henrietta Caroline Fox-Strangways, Mrs John Dyke Acland (1749/50-1815)
 oil on canvas 127 x 101.5 cm
National Trust, Killerton, Devon, UK

1771 Venus Chiding Cupid for Learning to Cast Accounts
oil on canvas 101 x 97.8 cm
English Heritage, Kenwood, London

1771-73 Sir Joseph Banks, Bt
oil on canvas 127 x 101.5 cm
© National Portrait Gallery, London


c1771-73 A Man’s Head: This small oil study of an old man's head angled sharply away from the viewer (in so-called profil perdu) was painted by Reynolds during the early 1770s from one of his favourite models, an old beggar named George White. Reynolds painted White frequently during the early 1770s in a number of different guises, including those of an apostle, a Renaissance Pope, a bandit and as the central figure in his first major history painting, Count Ugolino and his Children in the Dungeon (National Trust, Knole, Kent), exhibited at the Royal Academy in 1773.


c1771-73 A Man’s Head
oil on canvas 58.4 x 45.7 cm
Tate Gallery, London

1772 Rev. William Robertson, 1721 - 1793. Historian. Principal of Edinburgh University
oil on ncanvas 127.5 x 102.10 cm
Scottish National Portrait Gallery, Edingburgh, UK

1772-73 David Garrick: Eva Maria Garrick (née Veigel)
oil on canvas 140.3 x 169.9 cm
National Portrait Gallery, London

1772-73 The Strawberry Girl
oil on canvas 97 x 84 cm
The Wallace Collection, London

1772? Doctor Samuel Johnson
oil on cavas 75.6 x 62,2 cm
Tate Gallery, London

c1772 Lady Mary O'Brien, later Countess of Orkney
oil on canvas 127 x 101.9 cm
Philadelphia Museum of Art, PA

1773 Anne Seymour Damer
oil on canvas 125.7 x 99.1 cm
Yale Center for British Art, New Haven, CT

1773 or before Mrs Hartley as a Nymph: Elizabeth Hartley (1751-1824) is depicted here as a mythological figure. She holds a young Bacchus, the ancient Greco-Roman god of wine and festivity. By the time this painting was exhibited at the Royal Academy in 1773, Hartley was one of the most celebrated actresses on the London stage. Reynolds exhibited this painting with the title ‘A Nymph with Young Bacchus’. It was not presented as a portrait of Mrs Hartley, but as a subject or ‘fancy’ picture. Such pictures incorporated imagined elements into a scene, particularly of women and children.


1773 or before Mrs Hartley as a Nymph with a Young Bacchus
oil on canvas 88.9 x 68.6 cm
Tate Gallery, London

1773 Boy with Grapes
oil on canvas 77.5 x 64.5 cm
Cincinnati Art Museum, Ohio

1773 Giuseppe Baretti 
oil on canvas 73.7 x 62.2 cm
Private Collection

1773 John Stuart, 3rd Earl of Bute
oil on canvas 236.9 x 144.8 cm
National Portrait Gallery, London

1773 Lady Cockburn and her Three Eldest Sons
oil on canvas 141.5 x 113 cm
The National Gallery, London

1773 Three Ladies adorning a Term of Hymen:The aristocratic Montgomery sisters, Barbara, Elizabeth and Anne, are shown decorating a statue of Hymen, the Greek god of marriage and fertility, with flowers. They were often nicknamed ‘The Irish Graces’, referring to the Greek goddesses of beauty and the sisters’ childhood in Ireland. The women’s poses are more often associated with the Graces than portraits of aristocratic women. The painting was commissioned by Luke Gardiner, Elizabeth Montgomery’s fiancé. A letter written by Reynolds to Gardiner promised ‘it will be the best picture I ever painted.’ 


1773 Three Ladies adorning a Term of Hymen
oil on canvas 233.7 x 290.8 cm
Tate Gallery, London

1773 Three Ladies adorning a Term of Hymen

detail


1773 Three Ladies adorning a Term of Hymen

detail


1773-74 Mrs Tollemache as Miranda: The scene is from act I, scene 2 of the 'Tempest'. Miranda (Mrs Tollemache) wears a white dress with a gold sash. Caliban is on the ground beside her while Prospero is in the trees behind.


1773-74 Mrs Tollemache as Miranda
oil on canvas 241 x 147.4 cm
English Heritage, Kenwood, London

c1773 Miss Ridge
oil on panel 74.3 x 63.5 cm
Cincinnati Art Museum, Ohio

1774 Edmund Burke, 1729 - 1797. Statesman, orator and author
oil on canvas 76.2 x 63.5 cm
Scottish National Portrait Gallery, Edingburgh, UK

c1774-75 Lord Henry Spencer and Lady Charlotte Spencer, later Charlotte Nares: The Young Fortune Tellers
oil on canvas 142.9 x 113.7 cm
The Huntington Library, Art Museum and Botanical Gardens, San Marino, CA

1774-76 Mrs. Richard Paul Jodrell
oil on canvas 77.5 x 64.1 cm
Detroit Institute of Art, MI

c1774 Lady Cockburn and her Three Eldest Sons
oil on canvas 141 x 113 cm
The National Gallery, London

before 1775 Admiral Sir Charles Saunders
oil on canvas 51 x 40.5 cm
National Maritime Museum, London