Prince Edward, later Duke of Kent (1767-1820)

Prince Edward, later Duke of Kent, painted in 1782 and in the Royal Collection, depicts the prince who would become the father of Queen Victoria — a biographical significance invisible to Gainsborough, who was simply painting a fifteen-year-old member of the royal family. The future Duke of Kent would later serve in the army, become a philanthropist, and father the future queen in 1819; his portrait by Gainsborough is thus a document of a lineage entirely unforeseeable at the time of its making. Gainsborough's approach to the young princes in the 1782 series combined the formal requirements of royal portraiture — the specific dimensions and format consistent across the series, the official presentation appropriate to the sitters' rank — with the natural, informal characterization that distinguished his work from Reynolds's more ceremonially staged alternatives. The Royal Collection holds the portrait alongside the entire 1782 series, making it possible to appreciate both the individual characterization and the collective visual statement of Gainsborough's royal commission.

Gainsborough renders the young prince with characteristic warmth, using the gentle handling and natural pose of his children's portrait manner.