The Exhibition Age 1760–1815

Angelica Kauffman, Portrait of a Lady  c.1775

Angelica Kauffman was hugely successful – by the 1770s, her work was so popular that one contemporary quipped, ‘the whole World is Angelica-mad’. In portraits like this, Kauffman helped establish and promote an image of feminine creativity and intellect. While we do not know the sitter’s identity, the writing instruments she holds emphasise her learning, perhaps even signalling literary ambitions. The book and statue of Minerva (the Roman goddess of wisdom) on the table, further underline this. Dressed in classicising robes, she looks confidently out at the viewer. Such images also reflect the strong network of women – patrons, fellow artists, intellectuals, and professionals – that Kauffman relied upon throughout her career.

Gallery label, February 2024

Robert Ladbrooke, Wood Scene  exhibited 1806

Thomas Gainsborough, Giovanna Baccelli  exhibited 1782

This portrait shows the famous Italian dancer Giovanna Zanerini, known on the stage as Baccelli, at the height of her career. Her elaborate costume seems to be adapted from the ballet Les Amants Surpris in which she had recently taken London by storm. Baccelli was the mistress of John Sackville, 3rd Duke of Dorset who commissioned the painting. The rapid brushwork, translucent paint and shimmering light effects are typical of Gainsborough’s style at this time. When the portrait was first exhibited, it was chiefly praised as an excellent likeness; ‘as the Original, light airy and elegant’.

Gallery label, February 2016

George Stubbs, Horse Devoured by a Lion  ?exhibited 1763

This is one of at least 17 works Stubbs made of a lion stalking and attacking a horse. Here he depicts the moment the lion sinks its teeth into the terrified horse, set against the backdrop of Creswell Crags in the Peak District. The painting showcases Stubbs’s anatomical precision, informed by his studies of caged lions at the Tower of London. It also highlights his efforts to raise the status of animal painting by showing its emotional and narrative power. By depicting the dramatic climax of the encounter, Stubbs evokes the awe and terror felt when faced with untamed nature.

Gallery label, December 2020

Thomas Daniell, Sher Shah’s Mausoleum, Sasaram  1810

This painting shows the monumental mausoleum of Sher Shah Suri (ruler of northern India from 1540–45) in Sasaram, a city in north-eastern India. Thomas Daniell and his nephew, William, visited Sasaram in February 1790 while undertaking an extensive tour to sketch sites across northern India. Daniell made this painting after his return to England, exhibiting it at the Royal Academy in London in 1810. Such images of India were popular with British audiences, offering a kind of armchair tourism. Daniell’s art helped shape British perceptions of Indian scenery and architecture.

Gallery label, August 2024

Francis Cotes, Anna Maria Astley, Aged Seven, and her Brother Edward, Aged Five and a Half  1767

The children in this portrait were the offspring of wealthy baronet and landowner Sir Edward Astley and his second wife Anne Milles. They are depicted at play on a classical terrace, reminiscent of the family’s grand estate at Melton Constable, Norfolk. Anna Maria, who waves her brother’s plumed hat above her head, died in childhood, the year after this portrait was painted. Edward, whose elder half-brother was to inherit his father’s title, lived to carve out a successful career as a soldier in the British army. It is thought that the portrait was commissioned by the children’s maternal grandfather.

Gallery label, February 2010

Sir David Wilkie, The Blind Fiddler  1806

David Wilkie suggests the emotional power of music here. He expresses the different reactions to the blind fiddler’s music – one young boy even pretends to play the fire bellows. This was only the second painting Wilkie exhibited publicly and it confirmed his reputation as a rising new star. A large crowd gathered around the picture when it was displayed at the Royal Academy. Exhibition-goers admired his observational skills, his characterisation, and his sympathetic view of everyday domestic life. It was hung next to JMW Turner’s A Country Blacksmith, which had a similarly subject and muted colours. Many contemporaries believed Turner was sparring with the younger artist.

Gallery label, February 2024

Benjamin West, Cleombrotus Ordered into Banishment by Leonidas II, King of Sparta  1768

Benjamin West showed this painting at the second exhibition of the newly formed Royal Academy. After several years in Italy, West had established himself in London as the leading painter of subjects from classical history. His example, and the Academy’s teaching, encouraged numerous young British artists to study in Italy.

His subject is an incident from ancient Greek history. Leonidas, king of Sparta, was usurped by his son-in-law, Cleombrutus. When Leonidas returns looking for revenge, his daughter pleads for her husband’s life. Leonidas is moved by her tears, and commutes Cleombrutus’s death sentence to banishment.

Gallery label, September 2004

Richard Cosway, Portrait of a Gentleman, his Wife and Sister, in the Character of Fortitude introducing Hope as the Companion to Distress (‘The Witts Family Group’)  1770

Although principally a portrait miniaturist (see cabinet 2: The Portrait Miniature in the Eighteenth and Nineteenth Centuries), Richard Cosway also produced some larger-scale works in oil. This allegorical portrait was painted following the death of a young London linen draper, Broome Witts, in 1769. Witts is shown here in the role of Fortitude, introducing his sister Sarah in the guise of Hope (left) to his wife Elizabeth, depicted as Distress. This memorial image was presumably commissioned by one or both of these ladies.

Gallery label, August 2004

Sir David Wilkie, The Bag-Piper  1813, exhibited 1813

David Wilkie had already made his name in the London art world when he painted this small picture. It shows a bagpiper seemingly lost in thought, his fingers poised to play. One early biographer claimed this subject had been in Wilkie’s mind since boyhood and includes the old kirk (church) of his hometown, Cults, in the distance. While this is debatable, the explicitly Scottish subject is unusual in Wilkie’s work at this time. He exhibited this painting at the British Institution in 1813. While this may reflect his hope to raise the status of Scottish art, The Bag-Piper also appealed to a romanticised image of Scotland.

Gallery label, February 2024

Joseph Mallord William Turner, The Garreteer’s Petition  exhibited 1809

The scene shows a young poet struggling for inspiration late at night in his garret, a cramped attic room. On the wall is an image of Mount Parnassus, the mythological home of the Greek Muses, indicating his high ambitions. Though the point of the image seems to be satirical, the picture was exhibited at a time when Turner was writing poetry himself so likely sympathised with the poet’s predicament. Turner rarely painted explicitly figurative works but may have been inspired to do so due to his rivalry with David Wilkie whose genre subjects were extremely popular in London’s exhibitions.

Gallery label, February 2024

John Opie, Portrait of a Lady in the Character of Cressida  exhibited 1800

We do not know the identity of this woman, but she is probably a celebrity or actress who contemporary viewers would have recognised. Opie was working at a time when fame was becoming an increasingly important part of artistic success. This painting appeared at the Royal Academy’s annual exhibition in 1800. Artists jostled to grab public attention, painting more flamboyant and dramatic pictures. Opie depicts his sitter as the heroine of Shakespeare’s tragedy Troilus and Cressida.

Gallery label, October 2019

Johan Zoffany, The Bradshaw Family  exhibited 1769

Small-scale group portraits like this, known as ‘conversation pieces’, projected an idealised vision of family life. This picture employs a pyramidal arrangement of the figures to express the structure of the family. Thomas Bradshaw (1733–74), a senior civil servant and politician, is shown at the apex of the pyramid. His family is arranged below him. The two women are Bradshaw’s wife, Elizabeth on the right, and, on the left, probably his sister. The two oldest sons are shown at the far left and right of the group. Their position in the composition serves to associate them both with the sheltered space of the family unit, and the outside world.

Gallery label, February 2016

George Morland, Outside an Inn, Winter  c.1795

George Morland was known for painting rustic country life. Here, he depicts a man departing from an inn, watched by a child from the open doorway. The traveller’s thick coat and shiny top hat suggests his affluence, in contrast with the humble inn keeper, who keeps a pig for food. The scene’s stark surroundings underscore the hardship of rural life. However, Morland may have been appealing to the popular market for simple, picturesque country scenes. At this time Morland began working on a smaller scale and often recycled compositions in order to increase his output. This painting is similar to an earlier print, and doorway exchanges regularly feature in Morland’s work.

Gallery label, February 2024

Gilbert Stuart, William Woollett the Engraver  exhibited 1783

This striking portrait depicts the engraver, William Woollett. With a copper plate in front of him and a burin or graver in hand, he looks up as if momentarily distracted from his work. The painting in the background offers the clue to his activity – it is recognisable as the acclaimed Death of General Wolfe by Benjamin West, which Woollett engraved in 1776. This was Woollett’s most commercially successful print. Gilbert Stuart’s portrait not only celebrates the engravers’ achievements, but also an important artistic collaboration. When Stuart exhibited the painting in 1783, it was praised for showing ‘the man himself’.

Gallery label, February 2024

Gilbert Stuart, Benjamin West, P.R.A.  ?exhibited 1781

The American-born painter Benjamin West was one of the most successful artists of his generation. He was one of King George III’s favourite artists, which gave him privileges and wealth that made him the envy of his contemporaries. This polished portrait suggests an affluent and genteel personality.

West’s studio in London was a gathering place for Americans studying art in Europe. Many of these returned home to pursue careers in their newly independent homeland. This portrait is by one of West’s most successful American students, Gilbert Stuart.

Gallery label, August 2004

Sir Joshua Reynolds, The Age of Innocence  ?1788

The identity of Joshua Reynolds’s young model is uncertain. It is perhaps Reynold’s great-niece Theophila Gwatkin, a Miss Anne Fletcher, or a Lady Anne Spencer (the youngest daughter of the 4th Duke of Marlborough). This painting is an example of a ‘fancy’ picture, a type of 18th century painting showing figures, particularly children, playing out various roles. It was painted over one of Reynolds’s existing paintings, titled A Strawberry Girl. He altered all elements of the girl’s figure except for her hands. The Age of Innocence was one of Reynolds’s most popular images – more than 323 full-scale copies were made of it between 1856 and 1893.

Gallery label, October 2023

George Romney, A Lady in a Brown Dress: ‘The Parson’s Daughter’  c.1785

George Romney was one of London’s most fashionable portraitists. He was particularly admired for the charm and simplicity of his female portraits. He chose not to exhibit his works publicly after 1772, instead relying on word of mouth for private commissions. Romney became known for his virtuoso ‘performances’ at sittings, quickly painting the sitters’ likeness directly onto the canvas. This painting demonstrates the artist’s loose, expressive brushwork. We do not know the identity of the sitter, but later, in the second half of the 19th century the work became widely known as ‘The Parson’s Daughter’.

Gallery label, February 2024

Thomas Stothard, Nymphs Discover the Narcissus  exhibited 1793

Thomas Stothard depicts a scene here from the Roman poet Ovid’s mythological narrative, Metamorphoses. The boy Narcissus, obsessed with his own reflection in the water, wastes away and turns into a flower. Here a group of nymphs discover the flower growing on the riverbank. The painting was first exhibited at the Royal Academy in 1793. Stothard’s steadiest form of income was book illustration, but his reputation as a history painter was beginning to grow in the 1790s. It was on this basis that he was elected a full member of the Royal Academy in 1794.

Gallery label, October 2023

Henry Robert Morland, A Laundry Maid Ironing  c.1765–82

This painting of a maid ironing is typical for Morland, who specialised in such ‘fancy pictures’ - subjects drawn from everyday life but with imaginative elements. He repeatedly painted and exhibited idealised pictures of young women in working-class roles, as ballad singers, oyster sellers and laundry maids. Here, the woman is shown passively gazing down, serene as she works, her tools and appearance pristine. There is little indication of her individuality, or of the real hardship of such domestic labour. Instead, she represents a contrived ‘type’, made attractive for contemporary middle and upper-class viewers and saleable for the print market.

Gallery label, June 2022

Thomas Whitcombe, The Battle of Camperdown  1798

This painting shows the naval battle that took place on 11 October 1797 near Camperduin, off the coast of North-Holland in the Netherlands. Whitcombe depicts the dramatic moments shortly after the British ship Venerable fired at its Dutch opponent Vrijheid. Just behind Venerable, to the right, is the Dutch ship Alkmaar in flames. The battle resulted in a resounding victory for the British fleet midway through the French Revolutionary Wars (1792–1802). Thomas Whitcombe specialised in maritime pictures, including of naval battles. Images like this, celebrating Britain’s naval power and victories, helped create a sense of national identity.

Gallery label, October 2023

Sir Henry Raeburn, Mrs H.W. Lauzun  ?1796

This painting depicts Anne Neale Lauzun (1776–1861), née Tucker. Born in Bermuda, her family were part of the British colonial administration. She spent her youth in Bermuda before moving to Edinburgh in 1792. Henry Raeburn painted this portrait in Edinburgh, possibly to commemorate Tucker’s marriage to Lieutenant Henry William Lauzun in 1796. The strong central light source and loose brushwork in this painting, reflect Raeburn’s cultivation of his own unique style as his career progressed.

Gallery label, October 2023

Sir Joshua Reynolds, Mrs Hartley as a Nymph with a Young Bacchus  exhibited 1773

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.

Gallery label, October 2023

John Hoppner, A Gale of Wind  c.1794

John Hoppner was one of the leading portraitists of his day. When he exhibited this painting at the Royal Academy in 1794, it would have stood out to exhibition-goers as a highly unusual subject for the artist. Indeed, this is the only work Hoppner is known to have exhibited that wasn’t a portrait. We think the stormy seascape is set just off St Catherine’s Point in the Isle of Wight, an area known for its dangerous waters. The painting gave Hoppner an opportunity to show off his expressive brushwork and his ability to convey drama and narrative. Capturing a sense of the artistic competition of the time, one critic remarked: ‘The present aggression is incontestably bold, and well executed, and should be rewarded with a booty of reputation.’

Gallery label, February 2024

Henry Walton, Plucking the Turkey  exhibited 1776

This painting was exhibited in London in 1776, during the early stages of the war with revolutionary America. Walton’s image of a cookmaid plucking a turkey is an example of the kind of lowly subject-matter denigrated by Sir Joshua Reynolds and the new Royal Academy.

But it may also make a coded political reference. The turkey was very closely associated with America: Benjamin Franklin even proposed that it should become the symbol of independent America, instead of the eagle. The painting may, therefore, be a pro-British comment on the anticipated fate of the rebellious colonists.

Gallery label, September 2004

Julius Caesar Ibbetson, Sand Quarry at Alum Bay  ?exhibited 1792

Julius Caesar Ibbetson visited the Isle of Wight in 1791, which inspired him to paint many views of the coves and cliffs. This picture shows the local scenery at Alum Bay, with a group of men quarrying sand in the foreground. The famous Needles – a row of chalk stacks in the sea – are visible in the distance. This is probably one of the several coastal scenes of the Isle of Wight that Ibbetson exhibited at the Royal Academy between 1792 and 1796. Throughout his career, Ibbetson travelled widely, including to China and the island of Java in Indonesia (then a Dutch colony). Many of his landscape paintings were inspired by the places he visited.

Gallery label, October 2023

John Hoppner, Miss Harriet Cholmondeley  exhibited 1804

Francis Cotes, Portrait of a Lady  1768

This elegant and ornamental portrait

is a fine example of Cotes's style, which emphasises fashion rather than character. The sitter, whose identity is uncertain, sits on a garden bench in an artificial yet striking pose. Her gown and its lace are arranged decoratively about her, the pink and white colouring echoed by the foxgloves behind her, and the roses on the left. The portrait was painted in 1768, the same year as the foundation of the Royal Academy. Cotes was one of its founder members, which his prominent signature on the tree trunk, 'F Cotes RA px', proudly announces.

Gallery label, February 2010

Sir Henry Raeburn, Pringle Fraser  c.1804

Pringle Fraser was born in Lanarkshire, Scotland, in 1787. Here, he is around 17 years old. The dramatic lighting focusses attention on his face, illuminated against the dark, restrained background. This striking light effect and the fluid handling of paint suggests Henry Raeburn’s growing artistic confidence. By this time, Raeburn was celebrated as one of Scotland’s greatest portraitists. As an adult, Fraser travelled to India and joined the East India Company’s army, eventually becoming a Captain in the 7th Regiment in the Madras Native Infantry.

Gallery label, October 2023

Thomas Gainsborough, Sir Henry Bate-Dudley, Bart.  c.1780

The Reverend Henry Bate-Dudley was one of London’s most notorious newspaper editors. He first rose to fame through his journalistic writing in the Morning Post, before establishing the best-selling paper, the Morning Herald in 1780, which was renowned for its social gossip and political attacks. Thomas Gainsborough was close friends with Bate-Dudley. Here, Gainsborough conveys Bate-Dudley’s self-assurance and perhaps his loyalty through including his adoring dog. For Gainsborough, their friendship guaranteed he was championed in the press. Such public support was invaluable in the competitive art world. That Bate-Dudley divided public opinion, however, is apparent in one critic’s pun about this portrait, remarking that ‘the man wanted execution’.

Gallery label, February 2024