Henry II Bankes, MP (1757-1834)

Henry II Bankes MP (1757–1834) sat for Batoni in Rome in 1779 at the age of twenty-two, his portrait now at a National Trust property — almost certainly Kingston Lacy in Dorset, the Bankes family seat. Henry Bankes was a Member of Parliament for many years and a significant figure in early nineteenth-century British politics, but this portrait captures him at the very outset of his adult life during the Grand Tour. The Kingston Lacy collection assembled by successive generations of the Bankes family was one of the finest private collections in Britain before being given to the National Trust in 1982. A Batoni from 1779 would have been among the family's most prized acquisitions, displayed prominently in the house that the painting never left for over two centuries.

Oil on canvas from Batoni's late Grand Tour period — his output was slowing by 1779 as he aged, but quality remained high for prestigious commissions. A young English MP's portrait would receive full attention: elegant dress, Roman antiquities, and the confident three-quarter pose that Batoni had refined over thirty years of Grand Tour production.