John Thomas Smith. (1766 - 1833).
The (Unpublished) Illustrated Life of Hogarth, 1817.
see my posts
https://bathartandarchitecture.blogspot.com/2024/06/john-thomas-smith-perambulation-up-and.html
The author had been a studio-assistant of the sculptor Joseph Nollekens from 1779 to 1781.
He left to study with John Keyse Sherwin and at the Royal Academy. After three years he left and attempted live off his drawing skills. He gave up his topographical drawing and acting ambitions to compile Antiquities of London and its Environs which was later described as his favourite work. Smith became known as "Antiquity Smith"
Commercially unsuccessful as a draughtsman and engraver of London views, he took the post of Keeper of Prints and Drawings at the British Museum in 1816; and in 1828 published the first edition of this biography of the Sculptor Nollekens. Nollekens and his times.
His account is less an appreciation of the sculptor than a 'warts-and-all' biography, with anecdotes of the London art-world at the end of the eighteenth century. (A supplementary account of Nollekens was published by A. Cunningham in 1830.)
Francis Douce, Sir William Beechey and Smith were the executors of Joseph Nollekens' will,
Nathaniel Smith (1738 - 1809). was the father of JT Smith, he was a former assistant to the sculptor Louis Francois Roubiliac (d. 1762).
He resided and ran his business at the Rembrandt's Head, Great May's Buildings, St.Martin's Lane, London (in 1792-3, 1795, 1797-8). 8 May's Buildings, St Martin's Lane, London.
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I have a great fondness for Smith a man after my own heart who deserves to be better known. His works and drawings of London before the advent of photography can perhaps be parallelled with the works of George Scharf.
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No 1.
Inscribed in graphite, verso, center: "No 1 | Hogarth
carrying his Master's | sick child round Leicester fields | The Spot of ground
| Leicester house"
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No 2.
Inscribed in pen and black ink, upper left: "W H";
inscribed in graphite, verso, center: "No 2. | Hogarth engraving his
Master's | Shop-bills the sign of the Angel"
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No 3.
Inscribed in graphite, verso, center: "No 4 | Hogarth
declaring his love | to Miss Thornhill."
Inscribed in graphite, verso, center: "No 5 | Hogarth
after his wife had | put on a new night shift, Ties | up her things to send to
sir James | Thornhill with a letter in which | she told him "He took his
Daughter | without a Smock to her a--e"
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No. 6.
Inscribed in graphite, verso, center: "No 6 | Hogarth
has made breakfast | and sends up a cup to his wife | at the same time ordering
the | little dog to be admitted to her | mistresses bedchamber"
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No. 7.
Inscribed in graphite, verso, center: "No 7 | Hogarth
drinking the first | glass of wine with his wife | ---their dogs keeping |
respectful distances"
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No. 8.
Inscribed in graphite, verso, center: "No 8 | Sir James
Thornhill's boy entering | his Master's painting room to | deliver the bundle
and a letter in | the presence of Lady Thornhill"
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No 9.
Inscribed in graphite, verso, center: "No 9 | The Smock
exposed"
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No 10.
Inscribed in graphite, verso, center: "No 10 | The
reconsiliation".
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No 11.
Inscribed in graphite, verso, center: "No 11 | Hogarth
drawing Sarah Malcolm".
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No 12.
Inscribed in graphite, verso, center: "No 12 | Hogarth
painting in Vauxhall | gdens in the presence of | Jonathan Tyers"
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No 13.
Inscribed in graphite, verso, center: "No 13 | Hogarth
painting his | picture of Capt Coram for the | Foundling Hospital"
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No 14.
Inscribed in graphite, verso, center: "No 14 | Hogarth
solicits his Patron | Bishop Hoadley to look over | his M.S of "Analysis
of beauty"
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no 15.
Inscribed in graphite, verso, center: "No 15 | Hogarth
making up a portrait of H. Fielding, | for a Bookseller, from the features of |
Garrick who borrowed one of the Author's | wigs for that particular purpose
there | being no genuine portrait of him".
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No 16.
Inscribed in graphite, verso, center: "No 16 | Hogarth
painting "The Ladys last stake" | in the presence of Lord
Charlemont."
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No 17.
Inscribed in graphite, verso, center: "No 17 | Hogarth
sitting to Ronbeliac (Roubiliac) for | his Bust".
Note the model of Trump. Smith will have known the bust and model of the dog which had been owned by his father Nathaniel Smith and sold at auction in 1805.
Inscribed in graphite, verso, center: "No 18 | Hogarth
at Old Slaughter's | hobbing with Highmore | the painter."
Inscribed in graphite, verso, center: "No 19 | Hogarth
having been followed by | Barry and a friend was caught | backing a boy to
fight-purposely | to catch his fearful countenance".
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No. 20.
Inscribed in graphite, verso, center: "No 20 | The
Eleventh hour".
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A list of the published works of John Thomas Smith -
JT Smith, Nollekens and his Times. Published London, by Henry Colburn, New Burlington Street, Octr 1828'
A must read for anyone interested in 18th and Early 19th Century Sculpture.
The author had been a studio-assistant of Nollekens from
1779 to 1781. Commercially unsuccessful as a draughtsman and engraver of London
views, he took the post of Keeper of Prints and Drawings at the British Museum
in 1816; and in 1828 published the first edition of this biography. His account
is less an appreciation of the sculptor than a 'warts-and-all' biography, with
anecdotes of the London art-world at the end of the eighteenth century. (A
supplementary account of Nollekens was published by A. Cunningham in 1830.)
Smith, John Thomas, A Book for a Rainy Day or Recollections
of the Events of the Years
Smith, John Thomas, Ancient Topography of London; containing
not only views of buildings, which in many instances no longer exist, and for
the most part were never before published; but some account of places and
customs either unknown, or overlooked by the London Historians, (London: J.
McCreery, 1815).
Available on line at -
https://catalog.hathitrust.org/Record/010250321
Smith, John Thomas, Antiquities of London and its Environs;
by John Thomas Smith:
https://catalog.hathitrust.org/Record/102491604
Smith, John Thomas, Antiquities of Westminster; The Old Palace; St Stephen’s Chapel, (Now the House of Commons) &c. &c. Containing Two Hundred and Forty-Six Engravings of Topographical Objects, of which one hundred and twenty-two no longer remain. By John Thomas Smith. This work contains copies of manuscripts which throw new and unexpected light on the ancient history of the Arts in England, (London: T. Bensley, [1800-1807]).
https://catalog.hathitrust.org/Record/100218807
also
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Smith, John Thomas, Tag, Rag and Bob-Tail! being Portraits of Sixteen Notorious Personages, (famous and infamous,) chiefly about Cromwell’s time; Copied, with Accuracy, from very scarce Original Prints; and now First Published; For I. T. Smith [sic].
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The Antiquities of London, (London: J. Jones, 1800).
Smith, John Thomas,
The Cries of London: Exhibiting several of the Itinerant Traders of Antient
[sic] and Modern Times. Copied from Rare Engravings or Drawn from the Life,
with a Memoir and Portrait of the Author, ed. by J. Nichols, (London: John
Bowyer Nichols and Son, 1839).
Smith, John Thomas, Vagabondiana; or, Anecdotes of Mendicant
Wanderers through the Streets of London; with Portraits of the most Remarkable,
Drawn from the Life by John Thomas Smith, Keeper of the Prints in the British
Museum, (London: Published by the Proprietor: and sold by Messrs. J. and A.
Arch, Cornhill; Mr. Hatchard, Bookseller to The Queen, Piccadilly; and Mr.
Clarke, Bond-Street, 1817).
SMITH, John Thomas. Remarks on Rural Scenery with twenty
etchings of cottages, from nature; and some observations and precepts relative
to the pictoresque. June MDCCXCVII. printed [by Joseph Downes] for, and sold by
Nathaniel Smith ancient Print seller at Rembrandts-Head May’s Buildings, St.
Martin’s Lane, and J. T. Smith, at No 40 Frith Street Soho, 1797.
https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=gri.ark:/13960/t4jm2zk3g&seq=7
Remarks on Rural Scenery is Smith’s shortest publication.
It consists of a series of twenty etchings that were made “after nature”
and depict the most various kinds of rural housings for the poor on theoutskirts of London. The places are specified as
precisely as possible, and in two cases even the names of the residents are
mentioned. It includes an introductory essay by Smith dealing with
– as the subtitles states –“Some observations, and Precepts relative to the
Picturesque”.
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John Thomas Smith, William Blake and John Constable.
As the first biographer of the painter-poet William Blake,
his testimonies of the befriended artist are invaluable. It later turned out
that Smith’s analysis of Blake’s work, familiar only to closest artist friends,
was astoundingly acute and clairvoyant. In his capacity as a private drawing
teacher, his intuition regarding his student John Constable was no less
seminal. Smith’s teachings had a shaping influence on the development of this
future pioneer of atmospheric landscape painting. Moreover, Smith can be
regarded as the first British artist who used the new technique of lithography
in the context of book art.
John Constable was 20 when, in March 1797, he wrote with a
heavy heart to his friend J. T. Smith: "I must now take your advice and attend to my father’s business, as we are likely soon to lose an old servant (our
clerk), who has been with us eighteen years; and now I see plainly it will be
my lot to walk through life in a path contrary to that in which my inclination
would lead me.’
Fortunately his younger brother took over and John Constable was able to persue his artisic career.
A drawing by Constable of 1805 dedicated to JT Smith
https://www.britishmuseum.org/collection/object/P_1936-0314-1
The drawing bears an inscription to J.T.Smith, one of
Constable's earliest mentors, who was then Keeper of the Prints and Drawings
collection in the British Museum.
The Memoir of Blake by John Thomas Smith, Keeper of the Prints and Drawings in the British Museum, is the last of the 'Biographical Sketches and Anecdotes of several Artists and others contemporary with Nollekens,' contained in the second volume of 'Nollekens and his Times: comprehending a Life of that celebrated Sculptor; and Memoirs of several contemporary Artists, from the time of Roubiliac, Hogarth, and Reynolds, to that of Fuseli, Flaxman, and Blake.' (London: Henry Colburn, New Burlington Street, 1828.) It contains more facts at first hand than any other account of Blake, and is really the foundation of all subsequent biographies
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