Bath, Art and Architecture: Bust of George Clarke, Codrington Library, John Cheere

Friday, 27 April 2018

Bust of George Clarke, Codrington Library, John Cheere

The Codrington Library Plaster Busts by John Cheere.

All Souls College, Oxford University .

Part 4. Dr George Clarke (1661 - 1736).

Fellow of All Souls College. M.P. for the University of Oxford, Architect.

George Clarke (1661-1736), Fellow of All Souls from 1680 until his death, Tory politician - MP for Oxford in 1685, Winchelsea in 1702, and East Looe in 1705,

Clarke returned to the House of Commons as MP for Oxford University at a by-election on 4 December 1717 following the death of William Whitelock.[3] He was re elected in 1722, 1727, and 1734, by which point he had lost his left eye and was losing sight in the other.

An architect and collector, he held various offices under the Tories, including secretary at war to William III, before being appointed to the commission of the Admiralty in 1710.

He was also secretary to George, Prince of Denmark. At the death of Queen Anne, however, he lost office.

Nonetheless, Clarke remained MP for Oxford University and he was able to indulge his architectural interests, playing a part in most of the University building projects of his time.

He became the University’s leading authority on aesthetic matters, designed Oxford Almanacks, and was involved in all major building projects.

He designed the Warden’s Lodgings at All Souls and completed Henry Aldrich’s designs for the Library at Christ Church; he worked with Hawksmoor and Thornhill at Queen’s College; and collaborated with Hawksmoor on the Codrington Library at All Souls.

He collected not just books, but also drawings and prints – all of which were left to Worcester on his death in 1736.

He inherited books and papers from his father Sir William Clarke (Secretary at War to the Commonwealth and Charles II), collected books, manuscripts, prints, drawings, and paintings, and acquired most of Inigo Jones’s library.

Disgusted by quarrels at All Souls, he left the bulk of his estate to the newly founded Worcester College, whose buildings he designed.

Curiously I could not locate any engraved portraits of Dr George Clarke - very surprising given his collecting habits and his interest in the visual arts.

This suggests that John Cheere or his workmen would probably have visited All Souls or Worcester College, Oxford to inspect the portraits in order to create his bust of Clarke.

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The Godfrey Kneller (1646 - 1723), type portraits.

Inscribed on two old labels, verso: This belongs to Lord Hyde, and: In Mary Shaw's legacy / to Lord Cornbury.

oil on canvas.

75.5 by 62.5 cm.; 29 3/4 by 24 3/4 in.

Sotheby's 9 December 2010, lot 252.

Lady T. Lewis, Lives of the Friends and Contemporaries of Lord Chancellor Clarendon, London 1852, Vol. III, no. 114, pp. 257, 429 and 430;

R. L. Poole, Catalogue of Portraits in Oxford, 1925, no. 114, Vol. II, pp. 189-190, and Vol. III, pp. 261-162;

R. Gibson, Catalogue of Portraits in the Collection of the Earl of Clarendon, Wallop 1977, no. 50, pp. 46-47

The sitter was the the son of Sir William Clarke, Secretary of War for the King during the Civil War. A Fellow of All Souls, and M.P. for Oxford University in 1685 (and later from 1717 to 1736), Clarke was himself Secretary of War from 1692 to 1704, Secretary to Prince George of Denmark when Lord High Admiral, and Lord of the Admiralty from 1712 to 1714. A prominent figure at court from a noted Royalist family, Clarke appears to have been a close friend of Henry Hyde, Lord Cornbury, later 2nd Earl of Clarendon, who inherited this painting from his father's secretary. It relates to two portraits at Worcester College, Oxford,(below) one of which is inscribed with the sitter's name.

Information above from Sotheby's see -

http://www.sothebys.com/en/auctions/ecatalogue/2010/old-master-british-paintings-day-sale-l10037/lot.252.html

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