Richard Pennant, 1st Baron Penrhyn of Penrhyn (1739 – 1808)

Reynolds painted Richard Pennant, later 1st Baron Penrhyn, around 1761, depicting a figure whose wealth derived from one of the most morally compromised sources available to Georgian Englishmen: Caribbean sugar plantations worked by enslaved labour. Pennant owned estates in Jamaica inherited from his father and later consolidated his position as one of the wealthiest men in Wales through the exploitation of the Penrhyn slate quarries in Caernarfonshire. He was an active opponent of the abolition of the slave trade in Parliament, defending his financial interests against the humanitarian campaign led by William Wilberforce. Reynolds's portrait participates in the broader visual culture of imperial wealth — the British portrait tradition served as a mechanism for laundering the origins of colonial fortunes, presenting their beneficiaries in the language of classical virtue and aristocratic dignity. The painting is now in a National Trust property, an institution that has in recent years acknowledged the problematic provenance of the wealth that built many of the houses in its care. The canvas sits within this larger reckoning with the material history of British imperialism.

The portrait presents the sitter with prosperous authority. Reynolds's handling creates an image of commercial and political power.