Portrait of the Vander Gucht Children playing in a Landscape; verso: A Male Nude--a sketch

Exhibited at the Royal Academy in 1786, the primary version of this composition is in the Huntington Art Gallery, Pasadena. While Reynolds' Sitters Book for 1785 is missing, in November of that year his ledger records 'The first payment. Mr. Vander Gucht, for two Children, 36, 15 shillings' (Malcolm Cormack, The Ledgers of Sir Joshua Reynolds, Walpole Society, XLII, 1968-70, pp. 105-60, 165, f. 76, r. V). No further payments appear to be recorded, although the entry suggests that others may have followed. That the Sitters Book for 1786 includes numerous appointments with Mr. Vander Gucht and his wife in the first four months of that year, commencing on January 4th, strongly suggests that there may well have been occasions when Mr. Vander Gucht's children sat to Reynolds in the previous year.

The present work is a late composition by Reynolds for which the demand for more than one version would have been typically strong. Although the condition of the Huntington version makes comparisons unrewarding, the Morning Herald of that time reported revealingly 'Portraits of two children. The chief recommendation of the performance is the admirable expression. The features of the younger child are warm with a diffusion of affection for his companion, and the elder appears to receive his infant token of love with grateful pleasure. In point of pencilling it is in an unfinished state.'

Several studio works are recorded including that formerly in the Oulton collection and sold, Park Palace, Monte Carlo, Feb. 23, 1935, lot 64.