Henry Grey (c.1671–1740), 1st Duke of Kent

This portrait of Henry Grey, 1st Duke of Kent, painted around 1705, depicts one of the Whig grandees who supported the Hanoverian succession to the British throne. Kneller, as Principal Painter to William III, Anne, and later George I, was the official image-maker of the constitutional settlement that made Protestant succession the foundation of British monarchy. The Duke of Kent's portrait participates in this project: recording the aristocratic network that sustained the new political order of parliamentary monarchy against Stuart-Jacobite restoration. Kneller's ability to depict aristocratic authority with dignity and elegance made him the indispensable portrait painter for the Whig establishment of the early eighteenth century.

The ducal portrait follows Kneller's efficient compositional formula for male aristocratic subjects, with authoritative pose, ceremonial costume, and the confident, broad brushwork of his studio production.