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    300 years
    Return to "London, Cardiff and New Haven 1982-83" is linked to these Works 146 items
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    Portrait of Francesco Zuccarelli

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    Portrait of Francesco Zuccarelli
    Portrait of Francesco Zuccarelli
    Portrait of Francesco Zuccarelli
    Tate, London 2014
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    Artist
    Richard Wilson (1713/14-1782)
    Title
    Portrait of Francesco Zuccarelli
    Date
    1751
    Medium
    Oil on canvas
    Dimensions
    Metric: 49.5 x 41.9 cm
    Imperial: 19 1/2 x 16 1/2 in.
    Collection
    Tate, London. To license image, click here.
    Accession Number
    N03727
    Wilson Online Reference
    P37
    Exhibited
    London 1925 (19 - Venetian Gentleman); Machynlleth 1937 (2); London, Royal Academy, 1960 Italian Art and Britain (158); London, Cardiff and New Haven, 1982-83 (59); Tercentenary 2014 (45)
    Provenance
    With P.E. Rossi, Bury Street, London; purchased by the National Gallery, 1923
    Signature/inscription
    Signed and dated right: R. Wilson f | 1751
    Subject
    The sitter was identified as the artist, Francesco Zuccarelli, by Michael Levey in 1959. In a letter to Admiral Thomas Smith written in Venice on 8 June 1751 [Wilson 1751] Wilson proudly referred to his meeting with Zuccarelli, one of Europe's best-known rococo landscape painters: [...] 'what tells better for my own private satisfaction is that Sigr Zuccarelli a famous Painter of this place made me Offer of his painting me a picture for a portrait of himself which I am doing with great pleasure'. Zuccarelli is known to have played a major role in persuading Wilson to change from portraiture to landscape painting before he left Venice for Britain. There he stayed from 1752 for ten years and returned in 1765, remaining until 1771. His career in Britain as a landscapist was successful, and in 1768 he became a Founder Member of the Royal Academy. Zuccarelli's rococo style of painting was seen by many contemporaries as more approachable than Wilson's seemingly rigid, classical manner.
    Related Paintings
    P35 River and Farmhouse -I , Victoria & Albert Museum, London
    Critical commentary
    Combining a highly individualised likeness with a graceful sense of informality, the portrait depends heavily on contemporary Venetian models and above all on Rosalba Carriera's celebrated pastel portraits. While the treatment of the neck-cloth and waistcoat resembles handling in earlier portraits such as P23 Portrait of a British Naval Captain, Castle Hill Collection, the softer and more luminous treatment of the head is surely the result of Wilson's modification of his earlier methods through the influence of Venetian painting. The left profile is ambiguous, with a rounder jaw showing in the underpaint.
    Bibliography
    Letter 1751; WGC, pp. 24, 62, 118, 155-56, pl. 9b as A Venetian Gentleman; M. Levey, 'Wilson and Zuccarelli at Venice', Burlington Magazine, vol. 101, April 1959, pp. 139-143, fig. 26; Sutton & Clements 1968, vol. 2, p. 3, fig. 3; sale cat., The Lyttelton Papers, Sotheby's London, 12 December 1978, p.101 (cat. 79); Solkin, 1982, p. 177; Apollo, June 1953; Wilson and Europe 2014, p.238
    Link to WG Constable Archive Record
    WGC/1/1/12
    More Information
    On the back of an old photograph belonging to the Tate is the stamp of a Genoese photographer, indicating an Italian provenance. The only other portraits Wilson is known to have painted in Venice are one for the German Ambassador and Mr Sackville 'which he is to send to my lord Middlesex'. The signature has been doubted on account of the short s. However, there are examples of this in drawings made both before and after 1751.
    Condition/Conservation
    Dimensions of frame: 62.4 x 55.4 cm (24 9/16 x 21 13/16 in.) Kate Lowry has noted: Red ground. Left profile may have been strengthened later. Pentiment on left side of coat opening shows orange paint beneath.

    Work of Art

    Paintings

    • River and Farmhouse -I , Victoria & Albert Museum, London

    Exhibitions

    • London, Tate Gallery, Cardiff, National Museum of Wales, and New Haven, Conn., Yale Center for British Art, 3 November 1982 - 19 June 1983
    • London, National Gallery, Millbank (Tate Gallery), 26 June - 30 September 1925
    • Machynlleth, Wales, 26 July - 14 August 1937
    • New Haven, Yale Center for British Art & Cardiff, Amgueddfa Cymru - National Museum Wales, 6 March - 29 October 2014

    Biographies

    • Admiral Thomas Smith (1707-1762)
    • Francesco Zuccarelli (1702-1788)

    Documents

    • William George Constable, Richard Wilson
    • David Solkin, Richard Wilson: The Landscape of Reaction
    • Martin Postle & Robin Simon, Richard Wilson and the Transformation of European Landscape Painting
    • Michael Levey, 'Francesco Zuccarelli in England'
    • Denys Sutton & Ann Clements, An Italian Sketchbook by Richard Wilson, RA: Drawings made by the Artist in Rome and its Environs in the Year 1754
    • Richard Wilson, Letter to Admiral Smith
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