Charles Townley in his Sculpture Gallery

Johann Zoffany painted Charles Townley in his Sculpture Gallery around 1781, depicting the celebrated collector of classical antiquities in his London house surrounded by his collection — including the famous Townley Marbles now in the British Museum. Townley was one of the great collectors of the age, and his sculpture gallery in Park Street was a pilgrimage destination for scholars, artists, and antiquarians. Zoffany's painting — like his Tribuna of the Uffizi — was a document of the culture of connoisseurship, depicting the collector and his collection in a relationship of mutual ownership and definition: the man defined by his objects, the objects given significance by the man.

Zoffany renders each classical sculpture with portrait-like precision while maintaining the atmospheric warmth of the gallery interior. The meticulous documentation of individual artworks and their display creates a record of extraordinary art-historical value.