_-_William_Wollaston%2C_MP_-_L2011.3_-_Holburne_Museum.jpg&width=1200)
William Wollaston, MP
Thomas Gainsborough·1759
Historical Context
Gainsborough's William Wollaston, MP of around 1759 depicts the Essex Member of Parliament with the combination of civic authority and country gentleman's ease that characterized the Georgian political class. Wollaston represented the Ipswich constituency during a period when local landowning families dominated parliamentary representation, and Gainsborough's portrait creates the appropriate image of established authority within the developing formal vocabulary of his Bath period style.
Technical Analysis
The portrait marks a stylistic turning point, with Gainsborough beginning to loosen his brushwork and develop the more fluid, atmospheric manner of his Bath period. The face is painted with greater breadth than his earlier Suffolk portraits, while the costume begins to be suggested rather than described.
Look Closer
- ◆Notice the stylistic turning point: this 1759 portrait shows Gainsborough beginning to loosen his brushwork toward the more fluid, atmospheric Bath manner.
- ◆Look at the face: painted with greater breadth than his earlier Suffolk portraits, the transition toward more confident, impressionistic flesh painting is visible.
- ◆Observe the costume: beginning to be suggested rather than fully described — the characteristic Gainsborough evolution from precise to painterly.
- ◆Find the civic bearing: Wollaston's status as MP is communicated through posture and expression rather than elaborate symbolic accessories.
_MET_DP162180.jpg&width=600)
