Sir Joseph Banks, Bt

Phillips's major portrait of Sir Joseph Banks from 1810 is his most celebrated version of this important subject—a carefully considered image of Britain's most influential scientific patron at age sixty-seven, when his dominance of the Royal Society and his importance in British intellectual life were at their height despite his physical infirmity. Banks's long presidency of the Royal Society from 1778 to 1820—forty-two years—made him the central figure in British scientific patronage for an entire generation, and his portrait by Phillips served as the official image of the Royal Society's president during this extraordinarily influential tenure. The Banks portrait demonstrates Phillips's ability to convey authority and intellectual distinction in a formal institutional portrait.

The portrait renders the aged Banks with authority and dignity. Phillips's warm palette and careful facial modeling convey both the sitter's intellectual weight and his advancing years.