A Rysbrack Self Portrait Terracotta Bust.
and a Marble Bust erroneously suggested as a Marble Self Portrait.
One of the problems with writing a blog like is is the number of distractions or rabbit holes to disappear into. I have been meaning to post this for a long time.
Whilst on a mission to record the busts at the University of Oxford a visit to the Ashmolean Museum on the 14th August 2019 with my camera brought me to an unidentified marble bust suggested and labelled as a possible self portrait of Michael Rysbrack.
Previously in 2014 whilst visiting Holland on another project I attended the exhibition of terracottas in the Collection of Charles Van Herck at the Bonnefantenmuseum, Maastricht. Netherlands where there was the terracotta self portrait.
This exhibition contained a small selection of his collection, which his relatives
placed in the custody of the King Boudewijn Foundation in Brussels, is usually
on display in the Museum of Fine Arts in Antwerp.
Until quite recently a drawing attributed to Jonathan Richardson the elder acquired, 1942, by the Victoria and Albert Museum, the oil by Vanderbank was the only portrait known until two versions of a type by Soldi appeared in the salerooms in 1970 (see below).
Both approximately 45 x 34 ½ in., virtually identical
and signed and dated 1753, they show the sculptor at work on the model of his
celebrated statue of Hercules [2] at Stourhead.
The first, provenance unknown, was lot 94 at Christie's, 10
April 1970; the other was at Sotheby's, 24 June 1970, lot 109, as from the C.
Fairfax Murray collection.
The self-portrait terracotta bust was executed for the sitter's patron Dr Cox Macro and delivered to his home in Suffolk, 1735.
.....................
The Portraits of Michael Rysbrack.
Portrait of Rysbrack.
Vanderbank (1694 - 1739).
c. 1728.
National Portrait Gallery.
Provenance -
Bought through Leggatt's, Peel Heirlooms sale, Robinson,
Fisher and Harding, 6 December 1917, lot 89; acquired, 1839, by Sir Robert Peel
'at Sir Wm Beechey's sale, Portrait of Rysbrack by Vanderbank for two
Pounds!!'. [1]
NPG 1802 is obviosly to be related to the engraving of 1734 by Faber junior with the same head lettered J. Vanderbank pinx. 1728.
In the
latter the sitter points with his left hand to a classical head different from
the one in the oil and reminiscent of that shown in 'A Conversation of
Virtuosis' by Gawen Hamilton.
https://www.npg.org.uk/collections/search/portraitExtended/mw05558/John-Michael-Rysbrack?
Paper size (35.2 × 25.3 cm),
Image: (31.8 × 25.3 cm).
Lettered in black ink, lower left: "J. Vanderbank
pinxt. 1728"; lower center: "Michael Rysbrack, SCULPTOR. | Antuerpiæ
Natus."; lower right: "J: Faber fecit 1734 | Sold by J Faber at ye
Golden head ye South side of Bloomsbury Square"
........................
The Portrait at the Victoria and Albert Museum suggested as Rysbrack by Richardson the Elder.
Captain HB Murray bought the picture for 16 guineas at a sale
at Christie's on 5th December 1908, where it was lot 107. The name of the
previous owner is not given in the sale catalogue.
I remain to be convinced of either attribution.
.............................
Rysbrack by Richardson the Elder.
Victoria and Albert Museum.
Inscribed - Michael Rysbrac, [sic.] statuary, drawn by old Mr. Richardson - J. Cranch.
Purchased 2 February 1942 from Mr. Herbert Bier, 2
Strathearn Place, London W2 (RPs: 42 / 110).
...........................
(Is this?) Michael Rysbrack.
Given that the website states that he was responsible for the Vauxhall Statue of Handel (Roubiliac now in the V and A ) it is probably fair to question the attribution.
................................
A Conversation of Virtuosi ...... at the Kings Arms.
Painted in 1734–1735 to 'promote his interest'
(the
completed picture was raffled, each sitter paying four guineas).
The figure of Rysbrack looks rather clumsily added to me - it has possibly been inserted at a later date.
The images provided here are not in high enough resolution to make any real comparisons but comparison with the so called Richardson portrait at the V and A (above ) might suggest that they are related.
Is the Richardson V and A portrait a study by Gawen Hamilton for the group portrait below.
This description lifted from the NPG website -
https://www.npg.org.uk/collections/explore/by-publication/kerslake/early-georgian-portraits-catalogue-a-conversation-of-virtuosis-.-.-.-at-the-kings-armes.-a-club-of-artists
Early Georgian Portraits Catalogue: ‘A Conversation of
Virtuosis . . . at the Kings Armes.' (A Club of Artists)
1384 By Gawen Hamilton, 1735.
Oil on canvas, 34 ½ x 43 7/8 in. (877 x 1115 mm); from left
to right, the names inscribed with black: in brown, holding book with both
hands, Vertue G; in grey, leaning on back of chair, Hyssing; in brown, seated,
holding a landscape drawing, Dahl; seated behind the table in blue, Thomas Aht
(?); [1] looking at the latter, holding a rolled paper, wearing slate grey
suit, Gibbs mr (?); gesturing left, in brown, J. Gouppy; seated, near side of
table, in grey suit with silver lace frogging, Robinson; leaning right, in
light blue, Bridgeman / Gar; in pale brown, holding scroll, looking back
towards him, Barren (?); [2] in pale brown coat, pale green waistcoat with gold
lace, resting his left hand on the shoulder of the next, Woolet (originally
Wooton); [3] in dark grey, holding dividers, his left hand on an antique female
bust, Rysbrac St.; behind the bust, holding brush and palette, Hamilton
(without inscription); holding dividers, in mid-brown coat, Kent; large room;
rear wall divided by pilasters, male and female statues in niches; brown carpet
with blue edging; a dog lying between the feet of Dahl and Robinson; far left,
table with two large books, a third book on the floor, leaning against it; top
right, a curtain drawn back.
Formerly catalogued as ‘A Club of Artists', Vertue's
description of NPG 1384 is here restored. He must have first seen the picture
in its unfinished state with only ten figures, mentioning it in an account of
Hamilton's work towards the end of 1734: 'But the piece of a Conversation of
Virtuosis that usually meet at the Kings Armes. New bond Street a noted tavern.
is truly a Master piece as far as is done. truly shews him a Master of Art. the
persons there represented. are ten' [4] Then follows the list of sitters,
sketched with a key: ‘Mr. Dahl, Mr. Wm Thomas. Mr. Gibbs, Mr. Hysing Mr.
Bridgman. Gardner. Mr. Baron Engraver. Mr. Wooton. Mr. Rysbrake statuary. Mr
Robinson a Gent. & Mr. Kent Vertue. Jos Goupy. and Gn Hamilton pictor.' [5]
The names of Vertue, Goupy and Hamilton are the last three in the list, while
in the key, Goupy is numbered11,Vertue 12, and Hamilton is not indicated. Kent
is behind the bust near Hamilton's present position. Consequently, Hamilton may
have been added later, and indeed, the paint is thin here.
Mr Thomas? see the anonymous bust by Rysbrack below.
There is little problem concerning the identity of the
sitters except for Thomas who is rather obscure. Mrs Finberg suggests that he
may be the 'steward to the Earl of Oxford' mentioned by Vertue in 1732 as
having his head modelled by Rysbrack. [6] He was co-arbitrator with Gibbs in
1723 for the Oxford chapel, Marylebone Road. Two successive William Thomases,
treated as one by Redgrave, are distinguished by Colvin, and judging by age, he
must be the earlier one. [7] Robinson is surely correctly identified by the
provenance and information in Brayley to which Mrs Finberg drew attention. The
father of the famous Mrs Montagu and an accomplished artist, his great nephew
states he 'excelled most of the professional artists of his day in landscape'.
[8]
The sitters are:
The painting appears to have been commissioned under rather
unusual circumstances. Vertue relates a proposition to promote 'the Interest of
Mr. Hamilton' by which each sitter paid four guineas and the completed picture
was raffled, the winner being Goupy, who later sold it to the Prince of Wales.
[9] This has not been verified, however. Horace Walpole, who confused Joseph
with his uncle Louis (d.1747), apparently knew a Goupy sale in March 1765 which
included ‘a piece in oil by Hamilton with portraits of several artists', [10]
where, Mrs Finberg suggests very plausibly, it could have been bought by
Robinson. [11] This sale is not otherwise recorded; a posthumous Joseph Goupy
sale, Langford and Son, 3 April 1770, lot 1826, does not contain anything
identifiable as NPG 1384.
The question of whether the painting represents a particular club of artists is too involved for lengthy discussion here. In favour is the suggestion of regular meetings—'usually meets' in Vertue's description—but Mrs Webb's view that the Society of Virtuosi of St Luke is depicted should be approached with caution. [12] The venue of St Luke's is not known so late.
While the group includes seven persons who had been stewards of St Luke's by this date, Bridgman, Dahl, Gibbs, Goupy, Rysbrack and Vertue, Kent was not elected until 1743. Goupy deserted in 1727 when his turn came to be steward, whose costly duty it was to provide hospitality on the annual feast day. It seems unlikely that he would have been included.
Seven of the artists, Baron,
Gibbs, Hamilton, Hysing, Rysbrack, Vertue and Wootton, were members of the less
exalted and less restrained Rose and Crown Club, possibly by this date, though
this is not altogether certain. But this usually met at the Rose and Crown in
Covent Garden, not at the Kings Arms in New Bond Street, and Vertue provides a
pretty full account of its membership, which does not include the other five
sitters. [13]
Vertue, it will be noted, does not himself use the term
'club', but simply refers to the picture as 'A Conversation of Virtuosis'.
Despite the title of the club The Virtuosi or St Luke's Club found in his
manuscript, [14] it seems safer for the present to regard 'Virtuosis', which
occurs elsewhere in his notes, [15] as a near synonym for cognoscenti and
artists. NPG 1384, then, may be considered a painting in which members of both
clubs happen to occur, rather than as either club in session.
It has been suggested that the group of fifteen figures in
the Ashmolean Museum once attributed to Hogarth may be by Hamilton and may even
be connected with NPG 1384, but it is not well preserved, and fuller
investigation would require confrontation of the two pictures. The Ashmolean
group was described by J.B. Nichols in 1833 as a 'Portraits of a Society of
Artists, that existed about 1730' [16] It is stated in 1827 to have born an
inscription which included 'Hamilton, Dahl, Laroon, Gibbon or Gibson, Rysbrach,
Vanderbank, Bridgman and Kent'. [17] Both references are nearly a century
later. While the style is reminiscent of NPG 1384, the composition is not
sufficiently connected with it. Five of those named were members of the Rose
and Crown club: Gibson, Hamilton, Laroon, Rysbrack and Vanderbank, but the
others are not known to have belonged to it.
Notes -
1. The last word is very rubbed; only the A is clear.
2. The last letter of the inscription has been altered to a
't'.
3. The last letter of the inscription has been altered.
4. Vertue, III, p.71.
5. Ibid.
6. Finberg, p.52, note 2; Vertue, III, p.57. The bust is not
known now.
7. Colvin, pp.608-09.
8. Climenson, p.3.
9. Vertue, III, pp.71-72.
10. Anecdotes, p.752.
11. Finberg, p.54.
12. Webb, pp 56-62.
13. VI, pp.32-35; for information concerning the clubs, see
Whitley, I, pp.7, 69, 74-77; II, pp.241-44.
14. BM Add. MS 39167, cited by Whitley.
15. Vertue, VI, pp.165-67: 'A List of Virtuosi in Italy'.
16. J.B. Nichols, p. 376; engraved by R. Cooper, O'D V,
p.54; the attribution to Hogarth is no longer tenable.
17. Literary Gazette, 1827, cited by Whitley, I, p.70.
18. Beauties, VIII, p.1127, note.
Condition: curtain appears faded; background worn near
statues; restorations to the inscriptions (as indicated); Kent now very faint;
paint between Hamilton and Kent thin; pin hole damages in corners; losses to
varnish along outer edges.
Collections: purchased, 1904, from Miss Elizabeth Montagu,
great granddaughter of Mathew Robinson; in Brayley's description, 1808, of the
Robinson house, Mount Morris, Horton, Kent, in which the family is said to be
'still in possession of the picture'; [18] this suggests that it may originally
have belonged to Robinson, although the identity of its first owner is
uncertain (see above).
Literature: J.B. Nichols, Anecdotes of William Hogarth.1833;
Elizabeth Montagu . . . Correspondence from 1720 to 1761,ed. E.J. Climenson,
1906; H.F.Finberg, 'Gawen Hamilton', The Walpole Society.VI, 1917-18; W.T.
Whitley, Artists and Their Friends in England 1700-99,1928.
.................................
A Conversation of Virtuosi at The Kings Arms.
Attributed to Gawen Hamilton - oil on canvas; Size 61 x 72
cm.
Ashmolean Museum.
This unfinished work may be related to Gawen Hamilton's
celebrated Assembly of Virtuosi of 1735 (National Portrait Gallery) see above.
The Assembly was etched by Richard Sawyer and published by
W.B. Tiffin, on 1 May 1829.
The etching identifies eight of the fifteen sitters, including the painters Dahl, Laroon, Hamilton himself and Vanderbank; the architect William Kent; the sculptor Rysbrack; the gardener, Charles Bridgeman, and an unknown 'Gibbons'. Although the etching calls the group simply 'A Society of Artists', it has been suggested that they may be 'Rosacoronians', members of the Rose and Crown Club.
The names from the print have been copied
out at the top left corner of the painting. The list may have been invented.
With production detail, "Etched by Richd Sawyer /
London Published May 1. 1829, by W. B. Tiffin, 3 Hay Market / Proof".
https://www.britishmuseum.org/collection/object/P_1851-0308-1
.........................
Andrea Soldi, 1703–1771, John Michael Rysbrack Modelling His Terra-Cotta Statue of Hercules.
1753.
Yale Centre for British Art.
The marble, which Horace Walpole considered Rysbrack’s “chef d’oeuvre,” was commissioned by Henry Hoare of Stourhead in Wiltshire and was completed in 1756.
A terracotta bust by Rysbrack is at YCBA .
The terracotta
model represented in the painting was bequeathed to Hoare by Rysbrack in 1770,
and it remains at Stourhead.
https://collections.britishart.yale.edu/catalog/tms:308
..............
The Rysbrack Terracotta Hercules.
in the Library at Stourhead.
.....................
The Self Portrait Bust
George Vertue mentions in 1732 a self-portrait bust and in 1752 a portrait by I. Whood finished by Vanhaecken, 'another picture of Mr Michael Rysbrack. sculptor drawn & painted by Mr. Isaac Whood who lately dyd some years before he began that portrait of Mr Rysbrack which was thought more like than that of Vanderbank - as it truely is. therefore it is lately finisht the posture hands &c. by Mr. Van achen ...'.
.jpg)
The Rysbrack Marble Bust of an Anonymous Man,
Ashmolean Museum.
Photographed by the Author in 2019.
Described as possibly a self portrait of 1730.
Is this the Mr Thomas included in the painting of A Conversation of Virtuosi ...... at the Kings Arms.
The bust from a Private Collection - on loan to the Ashmolean 2019.
Making comparisons with the terracotta above it is hard to reconcile that the two busts represent the same person - my guess is that the marble is an unrecognised and so far remaining anonymous bust by Rysbrack
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