An 18th Century Portrait; need opinions on who it is?
aconstas (6 pencils) | Thu, 2007-07-19 05:14I acquired an oil painting and I hope to find out more about it. Can anybody help?
I've contacted several museums and no luck yet. I believe it is 18th century by the clothing. It may have originated either from US or the UK. It kind of looks like a young John Hart, but thats just a guess. I have several other pictures of the painting saved as links on my website. The painting range from the numbers 1-11.
ex: http://www.aapossolutions.com/Painting6.jpg
http://www.aapossolutions.com/Painting9.jpg
Please give me any feedback.
Thanks,
Aconstas
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 Painting6.jpg | 1.21 MB |
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The portrait looks like an early 20th century knock-off to me. The frame dates to somewhere between 1890 to 1940 , and judging from the gilt-over-plaster work and crude joinery, would never have been considered high-quality. This might have been produced for mass market sale as an "instant heirloom," or it could have been a student's attempt to capture an older style of painting. I doubt it would even be worth the cost of having it appraised, although it's always fun to learn the provenance of curiosities like this. Naturally, I hope I'm quite wrong, and it turns out you've got a priceless "find." :-)
Mara
I would like to thank you for your input, but it is an original according to the collectors that I have let them take a look at. They told me that is was diffidently restored and the frame was an addition after is was re-stretch. If you take a closer look at my other links with the pictures you may see the crack in the oil painting that takes time. As far as the creditability of the collector that looked at the painting, he has a very nice collection, Rembrandt, Romney, ect., paintings. The NC Museum of Art said that it has had restoration but with out an history, or signature it may be hard to find the value of the painting. I do know the owner brought it from the UK and that it may have been an Admiral who passed it down through the family.
Thanks,
A Constas
http://www.aapossolutions.com
The cracking you mention is called "craquelure." It isn't a foolproof clue to the age of a painting, although many people think so. For one thing, it's easily faked by forgers -- not that I'm saying your painting isn't genuine. I'm only pointing out that this feature doesn't necessarily mean the painting is as old as you may think. There are many technical reasons why craquelure develops; one of them is poor quality of varnish. It can also mean nothing more than that the painting wasn't adequately protected from temperature and humidity changes.
The age of the canvas doesn't tell you much about the painting's age, either. It was common (and still is) for painters to reuse older canvases to save money. I have such a painting. The top layer, which is heavily cracked now, was done in the 1920s.
That the frame was added much later isn't surprising, but it does seem odd that a family whose ancestor the painting depicted would choose such a poor quality frame to replace the original. People of means would normally not do that. Of course, the family may have suffered a reversal in fortune. The fact that it is now in your hands would reinforce that idea.
It certainly is fascinating to speculate on who painted this portrait, and who the subject was. The painting seems to me to be the work of an amateur or student attempting to simulate an older style of portraiture, but who (in addition to being somewhat impatient with the finishing touches -- note the hastily and poorly executed cloth and lace, which very few 17th-19th century patrons would have found acceptable) -- was unable to overcome his or her own more modern "eye" when rendering the features of the young man's face. They are remarkably modern, aren't they? Compare with English portraits of the period you think this one might belong to, and tell me if you notice a striking difference in the aesthetic approach used. And if this fellow was an admiral, well, the painting lacks the heroic machismo characteristic of that class of portraiture -- another suggestion that this painting wasn't done by a professional portrait artist of the period you suggest. Maybe it was done by a young lady to romanticize her beau?
But I guess if you're socializing with people who own Rembrandts, you don't need to hear any of this from me ;-)
If you ever get the provenance of the painting worked out, I'd love to know the details.
Mara