Portrait of a Gentleman
Joseph Wright·c. 1770-1773
Historical Context
Joseph Wright of Derby's Portrait of a Gentleman, painted around 1770-1773, is a characteristic work from the artist's portrait practice that funded his more famous scientific and industrial subjects. Wright was uniquely positioned in English art as both a provincial portrait painter in the Midlands and an artist deeply engaged with the intellectual circles of the Industrial Revolution. His sitters often included the scientists, industrialists, and intellectuals of the Lunar Society.
Technical Analysis
Wright's portrait technique employs a warm, restrained palette with careful modeling of the face through subtle tonal gradations. His distinctive sensitivity to light effects, honed through his candlelight pictures, brings an unusual atmospheric quality to the otherwise conventional three-quarter format.
Provenance
William Curzon [1836-1916], Lockington Hall, Derbyshire; purchased 1916, at the dispersal of the Curzon estate, by Mrs. Claire Marion Cox, London, as _Richard, Earl Howe_, by John Singleton Copley; consigned 1932 by Mrs. Cox to (The Hackett Galleries, New York); returned to Mrs. Cox and later consigned to (Mrs. Chambers Wood, New York), who sold it 1932 to (M. Knoedler & Co., New York);[1] purchased May 1936 by The A.W. Mellon Educational and Charitable Trust, Pittsburgh; gift 1940 to NGA. [1] Knoedler's records give the early provenance (letter from Elizabeth Clare to NGA curator William Campbell, 5 November 1963, in NGA curatorial files). Clare quotes a letter from Mrs. Cox to Mrs. Wood, undated but presumably 1932, in which Mrs. Cox states that the 1916 dispersal "was a hurried executors' sale and few persons attended it."
