Fletcher Norton, 1st Baron Grantley, Speaker

Fletcher Norton, 1st Baron Grantley, served as Speaker of the House of Commons from 1770 to 1780, a period that included the turbulent years of the American Revolution, and was elevated to the peerage in recognition of his long parliamentary service. The portrait records one of the major political figures of the late Georgian era, commissioned in a tradition of parliamentary portraiture that documented the leaders of British constitutional government for public and institutional display. Parliamentary portraiture served both commemorative and didactic purposes, preserving the likenesses of those who had shaped British law and government while presenting models of civic dignity for future generations. The formal portrait presents the Speaker with the gravity and authority appropriate to his high constitutional office, Beechey's solid technique giving substance and presence to a figure who wielded considerable power during years of constitutional crisis and imperial expansion. Now in the Parliamentary Art Collection, this work remains in its proper institutional context as part of the visual record of British constitutional history.

The formal portrait presents the Speaker with appropriate dignity and authority, the robes of office painted with careful attention to their ceremonial significance.