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(After) Anthony Van Dyck
Double Portrait Oil Painting Brothers George, 2nd Duke Buckingham & Lord Francis

1680

About the Item

Aftrer Anthony VAN DYCK - maybe Studio (1599, Antwerp – 1641, London) Flemish Double Portrait of George Villiers, 2nd Duke of Buckingham (1628-1687) & Lord Francis Villiers (1629-1648) Oil on Canvas 170 x 147 cm Anthony Van Dyck (1599-1641) No painter has done more to define an era than Anthony van Dyck. He spent only seven and a half years of his short life (1599- 1641) in England. He grew up in Antwerp, where his precocious talent was recognised by Peter Paul Rubens, the greatest painter of his age. He worked in Rubens’s studio and imitated his style as a religious artist, painting biblical scenes redolent of the lush piety of the counter-reformation. But soon he was on the move. In 1620, he visited London for a few months, long enough to paint a history picture, The Continence of Scipio, for the royal favourite, George Villiers, Marquess of Buckingham, and a portrait of his other English patron, the great art collector, Thomas Howard, 2nd Earl of Arundel. After a stint in Italy, making imposing portraits of the wealthy aristocracy and sketching and copying works by Titian, he returned to the Spanish Netherlands in 1627, becoming court artist to Archduchess Isabella before departing for The Hague in 1631 to paint the Dutch ruler Frederick Henry, Prince of Orange. Charles I’s invitation in 1632 led Van Dyck back to London where he was knighted, paid an annual salary of £200 and installed in a house in Blackfriars with a special jetty at which the royal barge might tie up when the King was visiting his studio. By this time Van Dyck was recognised as the leading court painter in Europe, with Velazquez at the court of Philip IV of Spain his only rival. He also excelled as a superbly observant painter of children and dogs. Van Dyck’s notoriety in depicting children led to the introduction of groups of children without their parents as a new genre into English painting (amongst other new genres). For the next 300 years, Van Dyck was the major influence on English portraiture. Nearly all the great 18th Century portraitists, from Pompeo Batoni and Allan Ramsay to Thomas Gainsborough and Joshua Reynolds, copied Van Dyck’s costumes, poses and compositions. George Duke of Buckingham & his brother Francis Villiers Painted in 1635, this double portrait was originally commissioned by Charles I, who raised the two brothers after their father, George Villiers, was assassinated in 1628. Together with their sister, Lady Mary Villiers, they enjoyed the King’s favour absolutely. Francis whose absolute ‘inimitable handsomeness’ was noted by Marvell (who was killed in a skirmish near Kingston upon Thames). The young duke who commanded a regiment of horse at the Battle of Worcester, remained closely associated with Charles II, held a number of high offices after the Restoration and was one of the most cynical and brilliant members of the King’s entourage, immortalised as ‘Zimri’ in Dryden’s Absalom and Achitopbel. As a young man he had sold his father’s great collection of pictures in the Spanish Netherlands, many of them to the Archduke Leopold Willhelm. Painted for Charles I and placed near the portrait of their sister in the Gallery at St James’ Palace. The handling of both costumes is very rich, and the heads are very carefully and sensitively worked. That of the younger boy in particular is more solidly built up than the lower part of the figure. A preparatory drawing for the younger boy is in the British Museum. There are copies at, e.g., Highclere Castle, at Serlby Hall (formerly) and in the Royal Collection by William Hanneman, 1783. Vertue recorded in 1742 a copy by Ranelagh Barret. The copy formerly at Warwick Castle was at Christie’s, London, 17 May 1968 (Lot 84) and at Sotheby’s, London 13 July 1988 (Lot 22). A copy was at Christie’s, New York, 3 June 1987 (Lot 57). Another was on the art market in London in 1980. There is a copy at Blenheim Palace of the figure of the older boy. Small later copies are also recorded. The composition was much admired in the Eighteenth Century. A drawing of the head of the holder boy, at Chatsworth, is thought to be by Lady Burlington. Reynolds probably borrowed from the composition at least twice; it figures in the background of Zoffany’s group, set in the Second Drawing Room at Buckingham House, of the eldest sons of George III and obviously influenced the painter in other portraits by him of the royal children; and the pose of the older boy is close, in reverse, to that of Gainsborough’s Blue Boy. The current portrait of the Second Duke of Buckingham and his brother is a seventeenth century copy of a Van Dyck painting in the Royal Collection. Painted for Charles I by Van Dyck, the Duke of Buckingham and his brother was hung near that of their sister, Lady Mary Villiers, in the Gallery at St James's Palace. Horace Walpole said that 'nothing can exceed the nature, lustre, and delicacy of this sweet picture', which he regarded as 'one of the finest of this master'. Typically for Van Dyck the heads are very carefully and sensitively observed and the costumes richly handled. Charles II is known to have commissioned copies of the composition by his court artist, Henry Stone, known as “Old Stone”, as presents for members of the nobility. The Daniel Hunt painting is surely one of these commissions. Old Stone also made copies of another Van Dyck portrait in the Royal Collection—that of Charles II and his siblings—which were commissioned by Charles II for similarly self-aggrandizing purposes. Both compositions were much admired in the eighteenth century and their influence can be seen on the child portraiture of Reynolds, Gainsborough and Zoffany. It appears in the background of Zoffany's picture 'George, Prince of Wales, and Frederick, later Duke of York, at Buckingham House' (RCIN 404709).
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