Gainsborough’s Blue Boy

Lovely exhibition at the National Gallery featuring Gainsborough’s Blue Boy, on loan to the UK after leaving for America 100 years ago.

I was pleased I had done a curator’s talk on this show so I had a better idea why the pictures shown with it had been chosen. The show was gratifyingly busy with numbers being limited as it is in quite a small room but it was still quite difficult to read the information boards. Part of the need to queue was that people were spending quite a lot of time sitting in front of the star picture just gazing at it. He still has pulling power!

The Blue Boy himself is a proud but endearing figure and such a wonderful colour. When you see it in person you notice the landscape behind more which tends to get murky in reproductions. I love the idea that the suit was a studio prop and it was interesting to see it next to real Van Dyck costume works to notice how different it was.

It was a lovely idea to hang it with two of the Van Dyck’s which inspired it. It’s always good to see the National Gallery’s own picture of two Stuart brothers and it was fun to match this with two smaller brothers, George and Francis Villiers, from the Royal Collection. A nice touch to include more people of the Blue Boys own age.

I loved the hanging of Gainsborough’s Linden sisters opposite the Stuart brothers as their colour palate had been influenced by the brothers and this was much easier to see in situ. You then saw the colour combination again in the portrait of Mrs Siddons.

The gallery had also outlined a tour round the main rooms highlighting other related pictures as well as rehanging the main hall with Grand Manner portraits to complement the small show. The second time I visited, yes, I have been twice and may go again, I did go in search of Thomas Lawrence’s Red Boy which I hadn’t seen before.

Closes 15 May 2022

Reviews

Guardian

Telegraph

Evening Standard


 

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Sky Arts Portrait Artist of the Year Exhibition 2019

Image
Delightful exhibition at Clarendon Fine Art showing pictures from the Sky Arts Portrait Artist of the Year TV series. I had loved the series which had set nine artists, both professional and amateur, to paint one of three celebrities. It then had a semi-final and final with them all looking at one sitter and in the final they also took on a commission. I loved the way you watched a picture build and how some were then made or spoiled by one stroke of paint.   Finding these pictures I knew so well in the flesh was therefore fascinating. None of them disappointed. My favourite artist from the final, Tom Mead, works looked just as good in real life if not better as you could see the detail. The show included his impressive self-portrait which he submitted to enter the competition, a wonderful fragmented picture of his reflection in a mirror giving a sense of movement. I loved that it included a large version of him and a miniature. His commission for the final of Jazzie B was
Read more

Thomas Becket: Murder and Making of a Saint

Image
Stunning exhibition at the British Museum on the life and afterlife of Thomas Becket. I studied Becket both at A Level and at university so I was really looking forward to this show and it did not disappoint. From walking in to see an old friend, the early Limoges casket showing the murder from the Victoria and Albert Museum, I was gripped. The show told the story well using fantastic objects and led you through his life, the murder, the political aftermath, his sainthood and miracles, and how Canterbury became a major pilgrimage site. It is hard to pick out the best objects as so many were wonderful. I loved that they had early copies of some of the five eyewitness accounts of the murder which made you fell you were almost touching the event. I liked the manuscript on his time in exile which was almost like a comic strip. How wonderful to get a 13th century font from Sweden which shows how far and how quickly the news that Henry II had integrated the murder spread. I think my
Read more

Courtauld summer school day 1

Image
Today has been my first day of this year’s week at the Courtauld Institute’s summer schools. This year I am doing “Painting in Renaissance Venice” which is being led by Michael Douglas-Scott. It was nice to see some familiar faces and there are at least five of us who did Michael’s course last year. Today has been two lectures. Firstly setting out the background of Venice in this period looking at how the city had set up a myth of itself, the role of the Doge. the nature of the Republic and the role of citizens. The second lecture looked at why the nature of Renaissance was different in Venice. There was still a sense of the coming of antiquity and humanism but in Venice it fused with the Gothic and Byzantine rather than replacing it. The day ended with a choice of gallery talks. I went to one on the second floor of the Courtauld on the coming of Modernism. In essence it looked at the Impressionists and discussed what they were reacting against and what themes they portrayed. All in a
Read more