Robert Craggs Nugent (1702–1788)

Gainsborough's Robert Craggs Nugent of around 1760 depicts the Irish-born politician and moneylender who became one of the most prosperous figures in Georgian England through a combination of shrewd financial dealing and advantageous marriages. Nugent was created Earl Nugent and was a significant political figure in the mid-eighteenth century, his self-made fortune making him a characteristic figure of the era's social mobility. Gainsborough's portrait captures the confidence of a man who had risen through ability and opportunism.

Gainsborough renders the politician with characteristic warmth, the face painted with sympathetic attention to the lively, engaging features that contemporaries described. The handling shows the confidence of Gainsborough's early Bath period, with broader, more assured brushwork than his earlier Suffolk manner.