1.
1795 in art
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Events from the year 1795 in art. Nicolas-Jacques Conté patents the modern pencil lead in France and produces the first Conté sticks, william Blakes monotypes Nebuchadnezzar, Newton, The Night of Enitharmons Joy and Pity. Giuseppe Ceracchis marble portrait bust of George Washington Philip James de Loutherbourgs painting Lord Howes action, françois-Xavier Fabres Portrait of Lord Holland. François Gérards portrait of fellow-artist Jean-Baptiste Isabey with his daughter and his painting Bélisaire, francisco Goyas Self-portrait in the studio. Guillaume Guillon-Lethières painting The Death of Cato of Utica John Hoppners Portrait of the Frankland sisters
2.
1780s in archaeology
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The decade of the 1780s in archaeology involved some significant events. 1786, Antonio Bernasconi and Colonel Antonio del Rio examine the ruins of Palenque, making the first map of the site,1780, Tomb of the Scipios rediscovered in Rome. 1786, Gold thumb ring of Senicianus discovered near Calleva Atrebatum in England,1789, The Stony Stratford Hoard uncovered in England. Xagħra Stone Circle first discovered in Malta,1785, Engineer Diego Ruiz visits and publishes the first account of El Tajín. 1789, Saggio di lingua Etrusca by Luigi Lanzi,1780, The Society of Antiquaries of Scotland is formed. 1783, The Society of Antiquaries of Scotland is incorporated,1783, June 13 - Thomas Young, English Egyptologist. 1784, July 25 - Richard William Howard Vyse, English soldier,1785, November 24 - Philipp August Böckh, German classical scholar and antiquarian. 1786, December 11 - William John Bankes, English Member of Parliament, explorer,1787, March 28 - Claudius James Rich, English traveller and scholar. 1788, September 10 - Jacques Boucher de Crèvecœur de Perthes,1788, December 29 - Christian Jürgensen Thomsen, Danish archaeologist
3.
1785 in architecture
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The year 1785 in architecture involved some significant architectural events and new buildings. July 17 - A groundbreaking ceremony is held for the Pella Palace in Russia, designed by Ivan Starov, may 19 - Plaza de Toros de Ronda, Spain. Attingham Park, Shropshire, England, designed by George Steuart, chertsey Bridge over the River Thames in England, designed by James Paine and Kenton Couse. Marble Palace in Saint Petersburg, Russia, designed by Antonio Rinaldi, church of St. Stephen Harding in Apátistvánfalva. Odigitrievsky Cathedral in Ulan Ude, Russia, Palace of Iturbide in Mexico City, designed by Francisco Antonio de Guerrero y Torres. Rebuilding of Babolovo Palace in Tsarskoe Selo, Russia, by Ilya Neyelov, modifications to Neue Kirche, Berlin, by Georg Christian Unger after a design by Carl von Gontard. Mussenden Temple on the north coast of Ireland, october 29 - Achille Leclère, French architect William Cubitt, English civil engineer August 11 - Marie-Joseph Peyre, French architect September 26 - Ventura Rodríguez, Spanish architect and artist
4.
Joseph Wright of Derby
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Joseph Wright ARA, styled Joseph Wright of Derby, was an English landscape and portrait painter. He has been acclaimed as the first professional painter to express the spirit of the Industrial Revolution, Wright is notable for his use of chiaroscuro effect, which emphasises the contrast of light and dark, and for his paintings of candle-lit subjects. Many of Wrights paintings and drawings are owned by Derby City Council, Joseph Wright was born in Irongate, Derby to a respectable family of lawyers. The third of five children of John Wright, attorney, and Town Clerk of Derby, Joseph had two elder brothers, John and Richard Wright. Deciding to become a painter, Wright went to London in 1751, after painting portraits for a while at Derby, Wright again worked as an assistant to Hudson for fifteen months. Wright also spent a period in Liverpool, from 1768 to 1771. These included pictures of a number of prominent citizens and their families, Wright married Ann Swift, the daughter of a leadminer, on 28 July 1773 Wright and his wife had six children, three of whom died in infancy. Wright set off in 1773 with John Downman, a pregnant Ann Wright and their ship took shelter for three weeks in Nice before they completed their outward voyage in Livorno in Italy in February 1774. Downman returned to Britain in 1775, on his return from Italy he established himself at Bath as a portrait-painter, but meeting with little encouragement he returned to Derby in 1777, where he spent the rest of his life. He became increasingly asthmatic and nervous about the house, and for these complaints he was treated by his friend Erasmus Darwin, Ann Wright died on 17 August 1790. On 29 August 1797 Wright died at his new home at No.28 Queen Street, Derby, where he had spent his final months with his two daughters. Wright was a frequent contributor to the exhibitions of the Society of Artists, and to those of the Royal Academy, of which he was elected an associate in 1781 and his Old Man and Death is also a striking and individual production. It hangs in the Allen Memorial Art Museum at Oberlin College and its companion piece, Dovedale by Sunlight captures the colors of day. Another memorable image from his tour of the Lake District is Rydal Waterfall of 1795, cave at evening is painted with the same dramatic chiaroscuro for which Joseph Wright is noted. The painting was executed during 1774, while he was staying in Italy, notice the similarities to the Museum of Fine Arts, Bostons holding, Grotto by the Seaside in the Kingdom of Naples with Banditti, Sunset. Wright had close contact with the industrialists of the Midlands. One of Wrights students, William Tate, was uncle to the eccentric gentleman tunneler Joseph Williamson, Wright also had connections with Erasmus Darwin and other members of the Lunar Society, which brought together leading industrialists, scientists, and philosophers. An Experiment on a Bird in the Air Pump, shows people gathered round observing an early experiment into the nature of air, the Alchemist in Search of the Philosophers Stone depicts the discovery of the element phosphorus by German alchemist Hennig Brand in 1669
5.
Nicolas Benjamin Delapierre
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Nicolas Benjamin Delapierre was a well-known and highly regarded French artist during the second half of the 18th century. Although he began and ended his career in France—he was a student of Carle van Loo. In 1770 he achieved the title of “agree” at the Academy for a portrait of Catherine II, by 1786 Delapierre had returned to France and was well established in Lyon, where he exhibited four of his portraits at the “Salon des Arts” of Lyon. One of his paintings, Portrait of a Seated Gentleman, is the subject of some mystery, the well-executed portrait, dated 1785, shows an 18th-century gentleman sitting at a desk and beginning to write on a single sheet of paper. On the desk in the foreground is a copy of De la Caisse dEscompte and it is believed by some to be the earliest known portrait of Thomas Jefferson. The ownership of the prior to 1928 is unknown, as is the identity of the sitter. Both are being researched by Omnis, Inc, a Mother Feeding Her Child,1782 Portrait of a Seated Gentleman,1785 La Fileuse,1797 LExposition du Sallon des Arts de Lyon en 1786. Gazette des Beaux-Arts, Vol.86, December 1975, pp. 199–206, biography at Boris Wilnitsky Fine Arts Web site at the Wayback Machine BERGER, Benoît. Sur les traces du peintre Nicolas-Benjamin Delapierre in Bulletin municipal officiel de la ville de Lyon, 1er octobre 2007, pp. 1–2
6.
Portrait of a Seated Gentleman
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Portrait of a Seated Gentleman is a portrait painted by Nicolas Benjamin Delapierre in 1785. Neither the subject nor the provenance before 1928 are known, the canvas, signed B. N. De La Pierre, is dated 1785 and measures 29-1/2 inches by 24-1/2 inches. It shows an 18th-century gentleman sitting at a desk and beginning to write on a sheet of paper. On the desk in the foreground is displayed a copy of De la Caisse d’Escompte, the portrait was painted several years before Mirabeau achieved prominence. Both the subject of the painting and the provenance are being researched by Omnis. The provenance before 1928 is unknown,1 October 1928, Ugo Bardini sells to the art dealer 5 March 1929, Thos. Some believe the painting to be the earliest known portrait of Thomas Jefferson
7.
Joseph Duplessis
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Joseph-Siffred Duplessis was a French painter, known for the clarity and immediacy of his portraits. He was born in Carpentras, near Avignon, into a family with a bent and received his first training from his father. He subsequently studied with Joseph-Gabriel Imbert, who had been a pupil of Charles Le Brun, from 1744–47 or later he worked in Rome, in the atelier of Pierre Subleyras, who was also from the south of France. In Italy Duplessis became fast friends with Joseph Vernet, another Occitan and he continued to exhibit at the Paris salons, both finished paintings and sketches, until 1791, and once more, in 1801. His portrait of the Dauphine in 1771 and his appointment as a peintre du Roi assured his success and he received privileged lodgings in the Galeries du Louvre. In the Revolution, he withdrew to safe obscurity at Carpentras during the Reign of Terror, afterwards, from 1796, he served as curator at the newly founded museum formed at Versailles, so recently emptied of its furnishings at the Revolutionary sales. His uncompromising self-portrait at this time of his life is at Versailles and his portrait of Benjamin Franklin, more than any other, has fixed the image of Franklin for posterity since it is reproduced on the U. S. hundred dollar bill. His portrait of the financier Jacques Necker hung at Voltaires Château de Coppet, several reduced versions were made, one of which is at the Louvre. Many of his portraits received a wider circulation as engravings, un provençal, Peintre du Roi,2004. With catalogue raisonné and archival material, ISBN 2-9521063-0-4 Joseph-Siffred Duplessis The most comprehensive on-line sketch of his career. Portrait of a Gentleman, ca 1779 -1782, portrait of Chrisoph Willibald Gluck,1775 Joseph-Marie Vien,1782. A repetition, in oil en grisaille on paper, is at the Museum of Fine Arts, shown at the Salon of 1779. Ministère de la culture, Portraits by or attributed to Duplessis
8.
Thomas Gainsborough
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Thomas Gainsborough FRSA was an English portrait and landscape painter, draughtsman, and printmaker. He surpassed his rival Sir Joshua Reynolds to become the dominant British portraitist of the half of the 18th century. He painted quickly, and the works of his maturity are characterised by a light palette and he preferred landscapes to portraits, and is credited as the originator of the 18th-century British landscape school. Gainsborough was a member of the Royal Academy. He was born in Sudbury, Suffolk, the youngest son of John Gainsborough, a weaver and maker of woollen goods, and his wife, the artist spent his childhood at what is now Gainsboroughs House, on Gainsborough Street. The original building survives and is now a dedicated House to his life. Gainsborough was allowed to leave home in 1740 to study art in London and he assisted Francis Hayman in the decoration of the supper boxes at Vauxhall Gardens, and contributed to the decoration of what is now the Thomas Coram Foundation for Children. In 1746, Gainsborough married Margaret Burr, a daughter of the Duke of Beaufort. The artists work, then consisting of landscape paintings, was not selling well. He returned to Sudbury in 1748–1749 and concentrated on painting portraits, in 1752, he and his family, now including two daughters, moved to Ipswich. Commissions for personal portraits increased, but his clientele included mainly local merchants and he had to borrow against his wifes annuity. The Artists family and Self-Portrait In 1759, Gainsborough and his moved to Bath. There, he studied portraits by van Dyck and was able to attract a fashionable clientele. In 1761, he began to work to the Society of Arts exhibition in London. He selected portraits of well-known or notorious clients in order to attract attention, the exhibitions helped him acquire a national reputation, and he was invited to become a founding member of the Royal Academy in 1769. His relationship with the academy was not a one and he stopped exhibiting his paintings in 1773. In 1774, Gainsborough and his moved to London to live in Schomberg House. A commemorative blue plaque was put on the house in 1951, in 1777, he again began to exhibit his paintings at the Royal Academy, including portraits of contemporary celebrities, such as the Duke and Duchess of Cumberland
9.
Anton Graff
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Anton Graff was an eminent Swiss portrait artist. His pupils included Emma Körner, Philipp Otto Runge and Karl Ludwig Kaaz, Anton Graff was born as the seventh child of the craftsman Ulrich Graff and Barbara Graff née Koller at Untertorgasse 8 in Winterthur, Switzerland. In 1753 Graff started studying painting at the art school of Johann Ulrich Schellenberg in Winterthur, after three years he left Winterthur for Augsburg. There he worked with the etcher Johann Jakob Haid, however, only one year later he was forced to leave Augsburg. The members of the painters guild feared his competition. With a letter of recommendation from Johann Jakob Haid, he moved to Ansbach where he found employment with the court painter Leonhard Schneider until 1759, Graff travelled frequently to Munich to study the paintings in the different collections. In 1759 he went back to Augsburg and later moved to Regensburg, in 1765 he went back to Winterthur and Zurich. He thought he was not good enough to work for the court of Saxony. To give Hagedorn an impression of his talent he sent a self-portrait to Dresden, the self-portrait arrived on 16 January 1766, in Dresden. It was so well received that one day later Hagedorn worked out Graffs employment contract. In early 1788, the Prussian Minister Friedrich Anton von Heynitz made Graff the financially very attractive offer to work for the Prussian Academy of Arts in Berlin, on 7 May 1789, Graff informed Count Camillo Marcolini, general director of the Dresden Art Academy, about this. On 20 June 1789, Graff was appointed Professor for portrait painting at the Dresden Art Academy, Graff made portraits of nearly 1,000 of his contemporaries and was the leading portrait painter in Germany in the late 18th and early 19th century. Graff was also the portrait painter of German poets between the Enlightenment and the early Romantic periods. Many of them were also his friends, like Johann Wolfgang von Goethe whom he met in Dresden in 1768, Graff was the favourite portrait painter of the German, Russian, Polish and Baltic nobility. Among others he portrayed Stanislaw Kostka Potocki and his most important clients included Catherine the Great of Russia and Frederick the Great of Prussia. His portrait of Frederick the Great is regarded as his masterpiece, the painting is exhibited at Schloss Charlottenburg. Frederick the Great never posed for Graff, however, Graff got the authorization to watch the troops parade in 1781. This was the chance for Graff to study the physiognomy of the King, Graff was also very popular with the landed gentry, diplomats, musicians and scholars
10.
Hugh Douglas Hamilton
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Hugh Douglas Hamilton was an Irish portrait-painter. He spent considerable periods in London and Rome before returning to Dublin in the early 1790s, until the mid-1770s he worked mostly in pastel. His style influenced the English painter Lewis Vaslet, Hamilton was born in Crow Street, in Dublin, Ireland, in 1740, the son of a peruke maker. Unfortunately there is little concrete evidence for his earlylife, apart from his own drawings. He studied art under Robert West at the Dublin Society House - and won early success with crayon. He was very adept at building relationships with patrons from the days, taking up with the famous La Touche banking family of Dublin. Very little is known of Hamiltons career between 1756 and 1764, when he moved to London, Hamilton found great success in London through his pastel oval portraits, portraying royalty, politicians and celebrities of the day through this medium. Hamilton was often overwhelmed with orders, including commissions from the British royal family - such as Queen Charlotte and he showed with the Society of Artists and the Free Society of Artists from the mid-1760s to the mid-1770s. From the mid-1770s on, Hamilton became very interested in a softer, more form of pastel fresco, in which he blended crayons. In 1779 he travelled to Italy, where he remained for the twelve years, occasionally visiting Florence but mainly based in Rome. On the advice of artist John Flaxman Hamilton turned to oil painting and his portraits of this period include those of Dean Kirwan, George John, 2nd Earl Spencer, Countess Cowper, and the exiled Charles Edward Stuart. In 1791 Hamilton returned to Dublin, where he died, in 1796 he painted Lord Edward Fitzgerald, the Irish revolutionary. Hamilton was best known for his pastel portraits depicting the head. These pastels were lively and affordable, costing around six guineas a piece and they became very popular throughout Europe. For these oval portraits, Hamilton used handmade cream or off-white paper, usually medium in thickness and this speed and skill was necessary to ensure a steady flow of clientele, as Hamilton was very pressed with commissions for this portraits. While there is no surviving evidence on Hamiltons pastel technique, through close examination of his works. Hamilton most likely applied each tone to the portrait separately before blending to avoid dulling the image, when drawing a face, he first outlined the head and shoulders in a light tone, then added the features of the face in a faint carmine tones. He then blended the tones on the face using his fingers, after this, the background was filled in using the broad side of the pastel, avoiding the outline of the face
11.
Jean-Antoine Houdon
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Jean-Antoine Houdon was a French neoclassical sculptor. Houdon is famous for his busts and statues of philosophers, inventors. Houdons subjects include Denis Diderot, Benjamin Franklin, Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Voltaire, Molière, George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Louis XVI, Robert Fulton and he was born in Versailles, on 25 March 1741. In 1752, he entered the Académie royale de peinture et de sculpture, where he studied with René-Michel Slodtz, Jean-Baptiste Lemoyne, from 1761 to 1764, he studied at the École royale des élèves protégés. Houdon won the Prix de Rome in 1761, but was not greatly influenced by ancient, after ten years stay in Italy, Houdon returned to Paris. He submitted Morpheus to the Salon of 1771 and he developed his practise of portrait busts. He became a member of the Académie de peinture et de sculpture in 1771, in 1778, he modeled Voltaire, producing a portrait bust with wig for the Comédie-Française, one for the Palace of Versailles, and one for Catherine the Great. In 1778, he joined the masonic lodge Les Neuf Sœurs, where he later met Benjamin Franklin, for Salon of 1781, he submitted a Diana which was refused without drapery. Washington sat for wet clay life models and a life mask. These models served for many commissions of Washington, including the standing figure commissioned by the Virginia General Assembly, a cast of the latter is located in the Vermont State House. Perceived as bourgeois for his connections to the court of Louis XVI, he out of favour during the French Revolution. Houdon returned to favor during the French Consulate and Empire, being taken on as one of the artistic team for what became the Column of the Grande Armée at Wimille. He was made a Chevalier de la Légion dhonneur, on 17 December 1804, Houdon died in Paris on 15 July 1828, and was interred at the Cimetière du Montparnasse. On 1 July 1786, he married Marie-Ange-Cecile Langlois, they had three daughters, Sabine, Anne-Ange, and Claudine. Houdons sculptures were used as models for the used on various U. S. Postage stamps of the late 19th. US Presidents on US postage stamps Washington-Franklin Issues Arnason H. Harvard, chisholm, Hugh, ed. Houdon, Jean Antoine. Christopher John Murray, ed. Encyclopedia of the Romantic Era, 1760–1850, poulet, Ann L. Jean-Antoine Houdon, Sculptor of the Enlightenment. Memoirs of the Life and Works of Jean Antoine Houdon, The Sculptor of Voltaire, kessinger Publishing,2006, ISBN9781425499891 Marshall, Bill, Kaufman, Will, Johnston, Cristina, eds
12.
Jacques-Antoine-Marie Lemoine
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Not to be confused with the painters Marie-Victoire Lemoine or Pierre-Antoine Lemoine. Jacques-Antoine-Marie Lemoine, also Lemoyne, was a French artist, known primarily for portraiture and he declined to follow his fathers precedent in becoming a notary, and instead began study at the École des Beaux-Arts in Rouen. Having moved to Paris by 1772, he studied under Jean-Jacques Lagrenée and he was attracted to Parisian theater and music, and early in his career often portrayed actors, singers, and musicians, using pastels and chalk. He also worked in oil, watercolor, and porcelain, in the late 1770s or early 1780s, he may have sketched for fashion plates. In 1783, Lemoine married the artist Agathe-Françoise Bonvallet and he began his work as a miniaturist in the mid-1780s. His early miniatures are influenced by the free and painterly technique of Pierre-Adolphe Hall, in 1785, he painted Louise Benoît Zamor, the page of Madame du Barry and later revolutionary. The portrait is one piece of evidence for Zamors African origin, Lemoine invented a perspective easel for use in landscape painting, and another device to help create likenesses in portraiture. He also collected texts on geometry and perspective in relation to design, lemoines wife died in 1794, and he returned to Rouen, where he was appointed professor of drawing at the École de Marine in 1799. After 1798, he produced few works, but kept a pied-à-terre in Paris and he died at his home in Paris, and bequeathed his manuscript collection to the state. Germaine Greer points out that because Marie-Victoire Lemoine sometimes signed her works Lemoine, neil Jeffares, Jacques-Antoine-Marie Lemoine, Gazette des Beaux-Arts ser. Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, Presumed Portrait of Mademoiselle Duthé with Her Harp, object information and image Collections of the Louvre, works by Lemoine. Unless otherwise noted, information from Marjorie E. Wieseman, Perfect Likeness, European and American Portrait Miniatures from the Cincinnati Art Museum, p.225 online
13.
Buenos Aires Metropolitan Cathedral
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The Buenos Aires Metropolitan Cathedral is the main Catholic church in Buenos Aires, Argentina. It is located in the city center, overlooking Plaza de Mayo, on the corner of San Martín and Rivadavia streets and it is the mother church of the Archdiocese of Buenos Aires and the primatial church of Argentina. The Cathedral of Buenos Aires was rebuilt several times since its origins in the 16th century. The present building is a mix of styles, with an 18th-century nave and dome. The interior keeps precious 18th-century statues and altarpieces, as well as abundant Neo-Renaissance, during the definitive foundation of Buenos Aires by Juan de Garay in 1580, part of a block facing the main square was reserved for the major church of the town. This is still the location of the current Cathedral, which is the last building in a series of churches that occupied the site. At the time of its foundation, the town depended on the diocese of Asunción, the first main church of Buenos Aires was a modest building made of wood and adobe, and was replaced by a new one in 1605 by Governor Hernandarias. This second building was also in danger of collapse by 1616 and had to be rebuilt again, in 1620, Buenos Aires was made seat of a bishopric by Pope Paul V. Its main church now had the status of a cathedral, after 1662, the cathedral was again rebuilt under bishop Cristóbal de la Mancha y Velazco and governor José Martínez de Salazar, being re-inaugurated in 1671. The cathedral now had three naves covered by a roof and a tower. Due to the bad quality of its materials, the tower. The whole church was rebuilt, starting in 1684, under bishop Azcona Imberto. In 1695 the building was almost finished, with the towers of the façade. In the early 18th century the works were slow, and the first tower was finished only around 1721, the second tower was begun in 1722 and finished around 1725. The main façade was redesigned between 1725 and 1727 by the Italian Jesuit Giovanni Bianchi, the design of the new façade was directly inspired by Italian Mannerist architecture. On the night of May 23,1752, the nave of the cathedral collapsed, the only portions still standing were the façade and towers, but the rest of the building needed to be completely rebuilt once again. Italian architect Antonio Masella was put in charge of the project, Masella designed a majestic church, much larger than the previous structure, with a three-aisled nave covered with barrel vaulting and lateral chapels. A dome was to sit over the crossing, upon completion of the dome, however, fissures in the structure were detected and it had to be rebuilt
14.
Joshua Reynolds
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Sir Joshua Reynolds RA FRS FRSA was an influential eighteenth-century English painter, specialising in portraits. He promoted the Grand Style in painting which depended on idealization of the imperfect and he was a founder and first president of the Royal Academy of Arts, and was knighted by George III in 1769. Reynolds was born in Plympton, Devon, on 16 July 1723 the third son of the Rev. Samuel Reynolds and his father had been a fellow of Balliol College, Oxford, but did not send any of his sons to the university. One of his sisters was Mary Palmer, seven years his senior, author of Devonshire Dialogue, in 1740 she provided £60, half of the premium paid to Thomas Hudson the portrait-painter, for Joshuas pupilage, and nine years later advanced money for his expenses in Italy. His other siblings included Frances Reynolds and Elizabeth Johnson, as a boy, he came under the influence of Zachariah Mudge, whose Platonistic philosophy stayed with him all his life. The work that came to have the most influential impact on Reynolds was Jonathan Richardsons An Essay on the Theory of Painting, having shown an early interest in art, Reynolds was apprenticed in 1740 to the fashionable London portrait painter Thomas Hudson, who had been born in Devon. Hudson had a collection of old master drawings, including some by Guercino, although apprenticed to Hudson for four years, Reynolds only remained with him until summer 1743. Having left Hudson, Reynolds worked for some time as a portrait-painter in Plymouth Dock and he returned to London before the end of 1744, but following his fathers death in late 1745 he shared a house in Plymouth Dock with his sisters. In 1749, Reynolds met Commodore Augustus Keppel, who invited him to join HMS Centurion, of which he had command, while with the ship he visited Lisbon, Cadiz, Algiers, and Minorca. From Minorca he travelled to Livorno in Italy, and then to Rome, while in Rome he suffered a severe cold, which left him partially deaf, and, as a result, he began to carry a small ear trumpet with which he is often pictured. Reynolds travelled homeward overland via Florence, Bologna, Venice, and he was accompanied by Giuseppe Marchi, then aged about 17. Apart from a brief interlude in 1770, Marchi remained in Reynolds employment as an assistant for the rest of the artists career. Following his arrival in England in October 1752, Reynolds spent three months in Devon, before establishing himself in London, where he remained for the rest of his life. He took rooms in St Martins Lane, before moving to Great Newport Street and he achieved success rapidly, and was extremely prolific. In 1760 Reynolds moved into a house, with space to show his works and accommodate his assistants. Alongside ambitious full-length portraits, Reynolds painted large numbers of smaller works, in the late 1750s, at the height of the social season, he received five or six sitters a day, each for an hour. By 1761 Reynolds could command a fee of 80 guineas for a full-length portrait, the clothing of Reynolds sitters was usually painted either by one of his pupils, his studio assistant Giuseppe Marchi, or the specialist drapery painter Peter Toms. Lay figures were used to model the clothes and he had an excellent vantage from his house, Wick House, on Richmond Hill, and painted the view in about 1780
15.
George Romney (painter)
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George Romney was an English portrait painter. He was the most fashionable artist of his day, painting many leading society figures – including his artistic muse, Emma Hamilton, Romney was born in Beckside in Dalton-in-Furness, Lancashire, the 3rd son of John Romney, cabinet maker, and Anne Simpson. Raised in a cottage named High Cocken in modern-day Barrow-in-Furness, he was sent to school at nearby Dendron and he appears to have been an indifferent student and was withdrawn at the age of 11 and apprenticed to his fathers business instead. He proved to have an ability for drawing and making things from wood – including violins. All costs were to be borne by Georges father, in October 1756, Romney married Mary Abbot, but the couple were immediately separated when he was called away to York on business by his employer. After a year, Steele eventually agreed to cancel the apprenticeship, at Georges request, in 1757, Romney rejoined his wife and young son in Kendal, working as a portraitist, landscape and historical painter. In this period he became friends with Adam Walker, the inventor and writer, in March 1762, he parted from his wife, son and daughter, to seek his fortune in London, where he stayed until 1799. Throughout the separation, he maintained contact with his family and financially supported them, in 1763, Romney entered his painting, The Death of General Wolfe, into a Royal Society of Arts competition. According to friends of Romney, he was awarded the prize of 50 guineas. It is said that Sir Joshua Reynolds himself was the mover behind this decision. Despite his later success, Romney was never invited to join the Royal Academy of Arts, though he was asked, urged even and this decision certainly cost him valuable royal patronage and support from others connected at court. His own career supported this belief, and it was only towards the end of his life that he expressed the slightest regret for his views and his early years in the capital were something of a struggle financially. In September 1764, he travelled to Paris for a few weeks to study the works of the old masters, in 1765 he again won the second prize of 50 guineas in the Royal Society of Arts competition. In 1768, he made the acquaintance of Richard Cumberland, the dramatist, whose portrait he painted, and he also became friends with miniature painter Ozias Humphrey. In 1770 he started to exhibit his work at the Chartered Society of Artists rather the rival Free Society of Artists, by 1772 Romney was financially secure enough to make the journey to Italy to study the great artists of the past, as he had always intended. He set off in March, making his way through Europe, a letter of introduction allowed him to meet the Pope, Clement XIV, who allowed him to set up scaffolding in the Vatican to study the frescoes of Raphael. He spent 18 months in Rome making studies and sketches of the art works on view there. He returned to London in July 1775 after an absence of over 2 years, on his return, in 1775, Romney moved to Cavendish Square, in a house formerly owned by noted portraitist Francis Cotes
16.
Emma, Lady Hamilton
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Emma, Lady Hamilton, model and actress, is best remembered as the mistress of Lord Nelson and as the muse of George Romney. She was born Amy Lyon in Ness near Neston, Cheshire, England, the daughter of Henry Lyon and she was raised by her mother, the former Mary Kidd, at Hawarden, and received no formal education. She later changed her name to Emma Hart, details of Emmas early life are unclear, but at age 12, she was known to be working as a maid at the Hawarden home of Doctor Honoratus Leigh Thomas, a surgeon working in Chester. Then she worked for the Budd family in Chatham Place, Blackfriars, London, and met a maid called Jane Powell, Emma joined in with Janes rehearsals for various tragic roles. Emma started work at the Drury Lane theatre in Covent Garden, as maid to various actresses, Emma next worked as a model and dancer at the Goddess of Health for James Graham, a Scottish quack doctor. The establishments greatest attraction was a bed through which electricity was passed and this supposedly aided conception, and many infertile couples paid high prices to try it. At fifteen, Emma met Sir Harry Fetherstonhaugh, who hired her for months as hostess. She is said to have entertained Harry and his friends by dancing nude on the dining room table, Fetherstonhaugh took Emma there as a mistress, but frequently ignored her in favour of drinking and hunting with his friends. Emma soon formed a friendship with one of the guests, the dull but sincere Honourable Charles Francis Greville, second son of the then Earl of Warwick and it was about this time that she conceived a child by Fetherstonhaugh. Fetherstonhaugh was furious at the unwanted pregnancy but is thought to have accommodated Emma in one of his houses in London. Soon thereafter, Emma formed an attachment to Greville. When the child was born, she was removed to be raised by a Mr, as a young woman, Emmas daughter saw her mother reasonably frequently, but later when Emma fell into debt, her daughter, Emma Carew, worked abroad as a companion or governess. Emma was at Grevilles mercy and acceded to his request to change her name to Emma Hart. Greville kept Emma in a house at Edgeware Row, but he was in love with her and, wanting a painting of her, sent her to sit for his friend and it was then that Emma became the subject of many of Romneys most famous portraits. In fact, so began Romneys lifelong obsession with her, sketching her nude, through the popularity of Romneys work and particularly of his striking-looking young model, Emma became well known in society circles, under the name of Emma Hart. She was witty, intelligent, a learner, elegant and, as paintings of her attest. George Romney was fascinated by her looks and ability to adapt to the ideals of the age, Romney and other artists painted her in many guises. In 1783, Greville needed to find a wife to replenish his finances
17.
Alexander Roslin
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Alexander Roslin was a Swedish portrait painter who worked in Scania, Bayreuth, Paris, Italy, Warsaw and St. Petersburg, primarily for members of aristocratic families. He combined insightful psychological portrayal with a representation of fabrics. In his choice of style and lustrous, shimmering colors Alexander Roslin exemplifies Rococo and he lived in France from 1752 until 1793, a period that spanned most of his career. Rococo artists opted for a more jocular, elegant and ornate style, characterized by lightness, elegance and graceful approach to art and architecture. The painting by Roslin depicting Jeanne Sophie de Vignerot du Plessis, Alexander Roslin was born on 15 July 1718, in Malmö, Sweden, the son of naval physician Hans Roslin and Catherine Wertmüller. Stockholm had become an intellectual and artistic center since Queen Christina had established connections with Paris, at the age of sixteen he became apprenticed to the court painter Georg Engelhard Schröder in Stockholm, studying painting there until 1741 and beginning to paint large portraits in oils. Schröder was influenced by Hyacinthe Rigaud and Nicolas de Largillière, in 1741, Roslin settled in Gothenburg, and the following year moved to Scania, where he remained until 1745 painting portraits and also creating religious paintings for the church at Hasslöv. In 1745, Roslin left Sweden for Bayreuth, where he had invited to work for Frederick. In 1747, he moved to Italy to study the works of the great masters, while in Italy he portrayed, among others, the family of Philip, Duke of Parma in 1752. In the same year Roslin moved to Paris, at the age of 34, here, in 1759, he married the pastel painter Marie-Suzanne Giroust. The couple had three sons and three daughters, in 1768 Roslin painted her dressed in Bolognese fashion, Lady with Veil, a portrait that the art critic, writer and philosopher Denis Diderot judged très piquante. In 1767 he painted a portrait of them both, she is depicted working in pastels on a portrait of Henrik Wilhelm Peill, while Roslin points at a gold box he received from Peill as a present. The frame of the painting is inscribed Loin et près, showing that the portrait was a token of friendship and this painting was purchased by the Swedish National Museum in 2013. In Paris he was a protégé of François Boucher and his work became fashionable. He was chosen as a member of the French Art Academy and his early portraits are painted in bright, cool colours, and show the influence of Jean-Marc Nattier and Hyacinthe Rigaud. Around the 1760s he started using daring colouring in his paintings, such as in the portrait of his wife, Lady with Veil, and the Jennings Family. Roslin had great skill in painting the surfaces and texture of precious materials such as fabrics and jewels. In Paris he soon became one of the foremost portraitists of his time, valued mostly for practiced rendering of fabrics and gentle complexions
18.
George Stubbs
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George Stubbs ARA was an English painter, best known for his paintings of horses. Stubbs was born in Liverpool, the son of a currier and leather merchant, information on his life up to age thirty-five is sparse, relying almost entirely on notes made by fellow artist Ozias Humphry towards the end of Stubbss life. Stubbs worked at his fathers trade until he was 15 or 16, thereafter as an artist he was self-taught. In the 1740s he worked as a painter in the North of England. He had had a passion for anatomy from his childhood, in 1756 he rented a farmhouse in the village of Horkstow, Lincolnshire, and spent 18 months dissecting horses, assisted by his common-law wife, Mary Spencer. He moved to London in about 1759 and in 1766 published The anatomy of the Horse, the original drawings are now in the collection of the Royal Academy. In 1759 the 3rd Duke of Richmond commissioned three large pictures from him, and his career was soon secure. By 1763 he had produced works for several dukes and other lords and was able to buy a house in Marylebone, a fashionable part of London. His most famous work is probably Whistlejacket, a painting of a prancing horse commissioned by the 2nd Marquess of Rockingham and this and two other paintings carried out for Rockingham break with convention in having plain backgrounds. Throughout the 1760s he produced a range of individual and group portraits of horses, sometimes accompanied by hounds. He often painted horses with their grooms, whom he painted as individuals. Meanwhile, he continued to accept commissions for portraits of people. From 1761 to 1776 he exhibited at the Society of Artists of Great Britain, Stubbs also painted more exotic animals including lions, tigers, giraffes, monkeys, and rhinoceroses, which he was able to observe in private menageries. His painting of a kangaroo was the first glimpse of this animal for many 18th-century Britons and he became preoccupied with the theme of a wild horse threatened by a lion and produced several variations on this theme. These and other works became known at the time through engravings of Stubbss work. Stubbs also painted pictures, but these are much less well regarded. From the late 1760s he produced work on enamel. In the 1770s Josiah Wedgwood developed a new and larger type of enamel panel at Stubbss request, Stubbs hoped to achieve commercial success with his paintings in enamel, but the venture left him in debt
19.
Tate Britain
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Tate Britain is an art museum on Millbank in the City of Westminster in London. It is part of the Tate network of galleries in England, with Tate Modern, Tate Liverpool and it is the oldest gallery in the network, having opened in 1897. It is one of the largest museums in the country, the gallery is situated on Millbank, on the site of the former Millbank Prison. Construction, undertaken by Higgs and Hill, commenced in 1893, however, from the start it was commonly known as the Tate Gallery, after its founder Sir Henry Tate, and in 1932 it officially adopted that name. As a consequence, it was renamed Tate Britain in March 2000, the front part of the building was designed by Sidney R. J. Smith with a classical portico and dome behind, and the central sculpture gallery was designed by John Russell Pope. Tate Britain includes the Clore Gallery of 1987, designed by James Stirling, crises during its existence include flood damage to work from the River Thames, and bomb damage during World War II. However, most of the collection was in storage elsewhere during the war. In 1970, the building was given Grade II* listed status, the museum stayed open throughout the three phases of renovation. Completed in 2013, the newly designed sections were conceived by the architects Caruso St John and included a total of nine new galleries, with reinforced flooring to accommodate heavy sculptures. A second part was unveiled later that year, the centrepiece being the reopening of the buildings Thames-facing entrance as well as a new spiral staircase beneath its rotunda, the circular balcony of the rotundas domed atrium, closed to visitors since the 1920s, was reopened. The gallery also now has a dedicated entrance and reception beneath its entrance steps on Millbank. The front entrance is accessible by steps, a side entrance at a lower level has a ramp for wheelchair access. The gallery provides a restaurant and a café, as well as a Friends room and this membership is open to the public on payment of an annual subscription. As well as offices the building complex houses the Prints and Drawings Rooms, as well as the Library. The restaurant features a mural by Rex Whistler, Tate Britain and Tate Modern are now connected by a high speed boat along the River Thames, which runs from Millbank Millennium Pier immediately outside Tate Britain. The boat is decorated with spots, based on paintings of similar appearance by Damien Hirst, the lighting artwork incorporated in the piers structure is by Angela Bulloch. The main display spaces show the permanent collection of historic British art, the gallery also organises career retrospectives of British artists and temporary major exhibitions of British Art. Every three years the gallery stages a Triennial exhibition in which a guest curator provides an overview of contemporary British Art, the 2003 Tate Triennial was called Days Like These
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John James Audubon
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John James Audubon was an American ornithologist, naturalist, and painter. He was notable for his extensive studies documenting all types of American birds and his major work, a color-plate book entitled The Birds of America, is considered one of the finest ornithological works ever completed. Audubon was born in Les Cayes in the French colony of Saint-Domingue on his fathers sugarcane plantation and he was the son of Lieutenant Jean Audubon, a French naval officer from the south of Brittany, and his mistress Jeanne Rabine, a 27-year-old chambermaid from Les Touches, Brittany. They named the boy Jean Rabin and his mother died when the boy was a few months old, as she had suffered from tropical disease since arriving on the island. His father already had an number of mixed-race children, some by his mulatto housekeeper. Following Jeanne Rabins death, Jean Audubon renewed his relationship with Sanitte Bouffard and had a daughter by her, Bouffard also took care of the infant boy Jean. The senior Audubon had commanded ships, during the American Revolution, he had been imprisoned by Britain. After his release, he helped the American cause and he had long worked to save money and secure his familys future with real estate. In 1791 he arranged for his natural children Jean and Muguet, the children were raised in Couëron, near Nantes, France, by Audubon and his French wife Anne Moynet Audubon, whom he had married years before his time in Saint-Domingue. In 1794 they formally adopted both his children to regularize their legal status in France. They renamed the boy Jean-Jacques Fougère Audubon and the girl Rose, when Audubon, at age 18, boarded ship in 1803 to immigrate to the United States, he changed his name to an anglicized form, John James Audubon. From his earliest days, Audubon had an affinity for birds, I felt an intimacy with them. bordering on frenzy must accompany my steps through life. His father encouraged his interest in nature, He would point out the elegant movement of the birds, and he called my attention to their show of pleasure or sense of danger, their perfect forms and splendid attire. He would speak of their departure and return with the seasons, in France during the chaotic years of the French Revolution and its aftermath, the younger Audubon grew up to be a handsome and gregarious man. He played flute and violin, and learned to ride, fence, a great walker, he loved roaming in the woods, often returning with natural curiosities, including birds eggs and nests, of which he made crude drawings. His father planned to make a seaman of his son, at twelve, Audubon went to military school and became a cabin boy. He quickly found out that he was susceptible to seasickness and not fond of mathematics or navigation, after failing the officers qualification test, Audubon ended his incipient naval career. He was cheerfully back on solid ground and exploring the fields again, in 1803, his father obtained a false passport so that Audubon could go to the United States to avoid conscription in the Napoleonic Wars
21.
Charles Bird King
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Charles Bird King was an American portrait artist, best known for his portrayals of significant Native American leaders and tribesmen. Charles Bird King was born in Newport, Rhode Island, the child of Deborah Bird. The family traveled west, but when King was four years old, his father was killed and scalped by Native Americans near Marietta, because of the horrible death of his father, Charles and his mother moved back to Newport. When King was fifteen, he went to New York to study under the portrait painter Edward Savage, at age twenty he moved to London to study under the famous painter Benjamin West at the esteemed Royal Academy. King returned to the U. S. due to the War of 1812 after a stay in London, and spent time working in Philadelphia, Baltimore. He eventually settled in Washington, due to the appeal of the burgeoning city. In the nation’s new capital, the artist earned a reputation as a portraitist among politicians. These patrons included John Quincy Adams, John C, calhoun, Henry Clay, James Monroe, and Daniel Webster. King’s popularity and steady stream of work left him with reason or need to leave Washington. In 1827 he was elected into the National Academy of Design as an Honorary Academician, despite his wealth and societal standing, the artist never married, and lived in Washington until his death on March 18,1862. Upon his death, he bequeathed his collection of paintings, books, though King’s legacy lies in his portraiture, throughout his career he also demonstrated a great technical skill in still life, genre, and literary paintings. His inclination towards genre and still life paintings can be traced back to his stay in London. The 16th and 17th-century style attributed to masters in Northern Europe, especially that of the Dutch, while attending the Royal Academy, King was swayed towards the Dutch styles by the demand such works commanded, and also was able to see the works and learn from them. King took more than stylistic cues from these examples, as he employed some of the techniques which he saw. As Nicholas Clark wrote in 1982, King “sometimes relied upon Dutch prints for formal solutions and he was also commissioned by the government for portraits of celebrated war heroes, and privately by the political elite, all to portray important men before the time of photography. Despite his popularity at the time, King is often overlooked in the scope of art history when placed amidst the talent of his contemporaries. His relative obscurity may be due in part to his lack of innovation in his work and it is also due to the loss of most of his numerous Indian portraits to a fire in the Smithsonian, his work simply disappeared, so he was overlooked in succeeding generations. The Smithsonian art historian Herman J, the government, private collectors, and museums hold portraits by a number of talented United States’ painters, including George Catlin, James Otto Lewis, and George Cooke
22.
Washington, D.C.
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Washington, D. C. formally the District of Columbia and commonly referred to as Washington, the District, or simply D. C. is the capital of the United States. The signing of the Residence Act on July 16,1790, Constitution provided for a federal district under the exclusive jurisdiction of the Congress and the District is therefore not a part of any state. The states of Maryland and Virginia each donated land to form the federal district, named in honor of President George Washington, the City of Washington was founded in 1791 to serve as the new national capital. In 1846, Congress returned the land ceded by Virginia, in 1871. Washington had an population of 681,170 as of July 2016. Commuters from the surrounding Maryland and Virginia suburbs raise the population to more than one million during the workweek. The Washington metropolitan area, of which the District is a part, has a population of over 6 million, the centers of all three branches of the federal government of the United States are in the District, including the Congress, President, and Supreme Court. Washington is home to national monuments and museums, which are primarily situated on or around the National Mall. The city hosts 176 foreign embassies as well as the headquarters of international organizations, trade unions, non-profit organizations, lobbying groups. A locally elected mayor and a 13‑member council have governed the District since 1973, However, the Congress maintains supreme authority over the city and may overturn local laws. D. C. residents elect a non-voting, at-large congressional delegate to the House of Representatives, the District receives three electoral votes in presidential elections as permitted by the Twenty-third Amendment to the United States Constitution, ratified in 1961. Various tribes of the Algonquian-speaking Piscataway people inhabited the lands around the Potomac River when Europeans first visited the area in the early 17th century, One group known as the Nacotchtank maintained settlements around the Anacostia River within the present-day District of Columbia. Conflicts with European colonists and neighboring tribes forced the relocation of the Piscataway people, some of whom established a new settlement in 1699 near Point of Rocks, Maryland. 43, published January 23,1788, James Madison argued that the new government would need authority over a national capital to provide for its own maintenance. Five years earlier, a band of unpaid soldiers besieged Congress while its members were meeting in Philadelphia, known as the Pennsylvania Mutiny of 1783, the event emphasized the need for the national government not to rely on any state for its own security. However, the Constitution does not specify a location for the capital, on July 9,1790, Congress passed the Residence Act, which approved the creation of a national capital on the Potomac River. The exact location was to be selected by President George Washington, formed from land donated by the states of Maryland and Virginia, the initial shape of the federal district was a square measuring 10 miles on each side, totaling 100 square miles. Two pre-existing settlements were included in the territory, the port of Georgetown, Maryland, founded in 1751, many of the stones are still standing
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This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Bryan, Michael (1886). "Cochran, William". In Graves, Robert Edmund. Bryan's Dictionary of Painters and Engravers (A–K). I (3rd ed.). London: George Bell & Sons.
