Frederick Cornwallis (1713–1783), Archbishop of Canterbury

Frederick Cornwallis, Archbishop of Canterbury, was painted by Dance in 1768 during the prelate's tenure as head of the Church of England under George III. Cornwallis had been appointed Archbishop in 1768 after a career of comfortable advancement through the established church's patronage networks, reaching the highest ecclesiastical office with a reputation for amiable dignity rather than intellectual distinction. Dance renders the Archbishop in formal ecclesiastical dress—the vestments and insignia of Canterbury's primatial authority—with the composed expression of a church administrator at the summit of the institutional hierarchy. The Church of England's leadership portraits formed a significant category within Dance's documentary practice.

The archiepiscopal robes and formal bearing create the image of ecclesiastical authority that institutional portraiture required, with Dance rendering the rich fabrics and clerical vestments in careful detail.