Samuel Forster (1752–1843), DD

Samuel Forster DD, a Fellow of St John's College, Cambridge, represents Opie's academic portraiture at its most straightforwardly institutional. St John's, one of the largest and wealthiest Cambridge colleges, has an extensive portrait collection documenting its fellows and masters over centuries. Forster's remarkable longevity — born 1752, died 1843, a lifespan of ninety-one years — means he outlived Opie by thirty-six years, having been painted probably while he was a relatively young fellow. The 'DD' designation (Doctor of Divinity) indicates he was an ordained clergyman as well as an academic, a common combination in eighteenth-century Cambridge where fellowships were reserved for clerics until late in the century. Opie's portraits of divines, like his portraits of physicians and lawyers, tend toward the same sober dignity he brought to all professional male subjects.

Academic and clerical dress for a Cambridge portrait would include doctoral robes and possibly clerical bands — the specific combination of academic and ecclesiastical garments providing a compositional framework of dark gown and white linen. Opie's characteristic modelling focuses the expressive energy on the face while the gown recedes into darker tones.