.jpg?w=1)
Lot Essay
We are grateful to Dr. David Mackie for the following catalogue entry.
When a distinguished painter outlives a sitter of importance, who is in addition well-known, popular and handsome, scholars can expect problems. That was not understood by me when beginning the task of preparing Raeburn's complete catalogue and the portraits of Francis Horner present extraordinary difficulties, not all of which can be resolved.
The sitter was the eldest son of John Horner and Joanna Baillie and like Raeburn, his background lay in Edinburgh's linen industry. He graduated from that city's university in 1795 intent on becoming an advocate. After first eradicating his Scottish accent under the tutelage of Rev. John Hewlett at Shacklewell, Middlesex, and a legal training in Edinburgh, he moved to London, where in 1802 he was admitted to Lincoln's Inn. During that year, with his friends Francis Jeffrey and Sydney Smith, he founded the Edinburgh Review in which most of his writings appeared. With patronage from Lord Minto he became a Whig M.P. in 1806 and held a number of seats between then and his death. In his career he urged the abolition of the slave trade and the removal of restrictions on Catholics, and by 1815 was one of the most noted parliamentary speakers of his day. His health broke during the summer of 1816 and he left for Italy where he settled at Pisa, but died in February of the following year and was buried there in the Protestant cemetery.
Between the publication of J.L. Caw's work on Raeburn by Armstrong in 1901 and finishing the complete catalogue Raeburn studies were essentially dormant and nobody had previously been able to date the artist's work. As Horner had died in 1817, it was assumed that all portraits of him came from before that point. Richard Walker's important essay on the portrait of Horner in the National Portrait Gallery, London, (Mackie, op. cit., no. 407.1) records the old inscriptions on that picture which stated that it was primary, executed for Horner's brother and sister-in-law, and done from life in 1812. It seems to be the case that all other portraits of Horner are later and, remarkably, all are probably posthumous. The sitter's date of death was of no use in helping to establish Raeburn's chronology. There are many versions, perhaps ten in four different patterns. Consequently, the Horner portrait takes us immediately into the matter of Raeburn's studio practice, about which we know almost nothing. Although I have not expressed the view before in public, increasingly I tend to be of the opinion that Raeburn was his own studio assistant. On 12 January 1808 it was publicly announced that Raeburn was bankrupt and until his death he had limited funds. It seems possible that he could not afford studio help and that the more simply painted versions and repetitions of Raeburn portraits may be from his own hand. The range in quality among the different portraits of Horner ascribable to Raeburn is unusually wide. However, in photographs of the current version there is much to indicate Raeburn's activity. Raeburn himself owned a version of Horner's portrait but that cannot be confidently traced today. It was known to the earliest writers on the artist, was exhibited at the artist's memorial exhibition in his studio in 1824 and was most likely of the head-and-shoulder format we see here. Other works in the artist's own collection such as his portrait of Sir Walter Scott (Mackie, op. cit., no. 640) took this form. It is tempting to suggest that the example offered here could be the untraced version from Raeburn's own collection. That work was last recorded at the artist's studio sale (Christie's, London, 7 May 1877, lot 21). However, there is a near identical portrait to the one offered here which is now in the Art Institute of Chicago (accession no. 54.296, Mackie, op. cit., no. 407.c.2). The situation with the portraits of Horner is further complicated by the different patterns of the portraits. Not all follow the original example in the National Portrait Gallery, London. Some portraits show the sitter from the left, others show him from the right. Further interest arise from the existence of a posthumous busts of Horner by Raeburn's friend and fellow portraitist, Sir Francis Chantrey (1781-1841), one of which is in the north transept of Westminster Abbey. It was ordered in 1817 and completed six years later. Whitley records that the sculpture was posthumous and further records that the bust "is stated to have been modelled from Raeburn's portrait of Horner with the assistance of Horner's brother who sat to Chantrey for the purpose". Whitley doesn't give his sources. One version of the bust was exhibited by Chantrey at the Royal Academy exhibition of 1818, no. 1075. Numerous repetitions of Chantrey's bust were also made in both plaster and marble for which Chantrey charged respectively 5 guineas and 100 guineas, as recorded in his ledger (Royal Academy Library, London). It seems impossible to avoid the conclusion that between Horner's death in 1817 and Raeburn's death in 1823, the artist in Edinburgh was repeatedly painting Francis Horner who lay in a cemetery in Pisa. He painted him both half-length from left or right and three-quarter-length from left or right. Did he perhaps use a version of Chantrey's bust to assist him, in the same way we are told Chantrey used Raeburn's portrait? Did Francis Horner's brother assist Raeburn in the same way as he had assisted Chantrey? We do not know. A contemporary of Francis Horner said after his death that "the ten commandments were written on his face". His popularity as a man, his success as a writer and politician, and his beguiling looks led to interesting and perhaps insoluble art-historical problems.
David Mackie
St. Catharine's College
Cambridge University
When a distinguished painter outlives a sitter of importance, who is in addition well-known, popular and handsome, scholars can expect problems. That was not understood by me when beginning the task of preparing Raeburn's complete catalogue and the portraits of Francis Horner present extraordinary difficulties, not all of which can be resolved.
The sitter was the eldest son of John Horner and Joanna Baillie and like Raeburn, his background lay in Edinburgh's linen industry. He graduated from that city's university in 1795 intent on becoming an advocate. After first eradicating his Scottish accent under the tutelage of Rev. John Hewlett at Shacklewell, Middlesex, and a legal training in Edinburgh, he moved to London, where in 1802 he was admitted to Lincoln's Inn. During that year, with his friends Francis Jeffrey and Sydney Smith, he founded the Edinburgh Review in which most of his writings appeared. With patronage from Lord Minto he became a Whig M.P. in 1806 and held a number of seats between then and his death. In his career he urged the abolition of the slave trade and the removal of restrictions on Catholics, and by 1815 was one of the most noted parliamentary speakers of his day. His health broke during the summer of 1816 and he left for Italy where he settled at Pisa, but died in February of the following year and was buried there in the Protestant cemetery.
Between the publication of J.L. Caw's work on Raeburn by Armstrong in 1901 and finishing the complete catalogue Raeburn studies were essentially dormant and nobody had previously been able to date the artist's work. As Horner had died in 1817, it was assumed that all portraits of him came from before that point. Richard Walker's important essay on the portrait of Horner in the National Portrait Gallery, London, (Mackie, op. cit., no. 407.1) records the old inscriptions on that picture which stated that it was primary, executed for Horner's brother and sister-in-law, and done from life in 1812. It seems to be the case that all other portraits of Horner are later and, remarkably, all are probably posthumous. The sitter's date of death was of no use in helping to establish Raeburn's chronology. There are many versions, perhaps ten in four different patterns. Consequently, the Horner portrait takes us immediately into the matter of Raeburn's studio practice, about which we know almost nothing. Although I have not expressed the view before in public, increasingly I tend to be of the opinion that Raeburn was his own studio assistant. On 12 January 1808 it was publicly announced that Raeburn was bankrupt and until his death he had limited funds. It seems possible that he could not afford studio help and that the more simply painted versions and repetitions of Raeburn portraits may be from his own hand. The range in quality among the different portraits of Horner ascribable to Raeburn is unusually wide. However, in photographs of the current version there is much to indicate Raeburn's activity. Raeburn himself owned a version of Horner's portrait but that cannot be confidently traced today. It was known to the earliest writers on the artist, was exhibited at the artist's memorial exhibition in his studio in 1824 and was most likely of the head-and-shoulder format we see here. Other works in the artist's own collection such as his portrait of Sir Walter Scott (Mackie, op. cit., no. 640) took this form. It is tempting to suggest that the example offered here could be the untraced version from Raeburn's own collection. That work was last recorded at the artist's studio sale (Christie's, London, 7 May 1877, lot 21). However, there is a near identical portrait to the one offered here which is now in the Art Institute of Chicago (accession no. 54.296, Mackie, op. cit., no. 407.c.2). The situation with the portraits of Horner is further complicated by the different patterns of the portraits. Not all follow the original example in the National Portrait Gallery, London. Some portraits show the sitter from the left, others show him from the right. Further interest arise from the existence of a posthumous busts of Horner by Raeburn's friend and fellow portraitist, Sir Francis Chantrey (1781-1841), one of which is in the north transept of Westminster Abbey. It was ordered in 1817 and completed six years later. Whitley records that the sculpture was posthumous and further records that the bust "is stated to have been modelled from Raeburn's portrait of Horner with the assistance of Horner's brother who sat to Chantrey for the purpose". Whitley doesn't give his sources. One version of the bust was exhibited by Chantrey at the Royal Academy exhibition of 1818, no. 1075. Numerous repetitions of Chantrey's bust were also made in both plaster and marble for which Chantrey charged respectively 5 guineas and 100 guineas, as recorded in his ledger (Royal Academy Library, London). It seems impossible to avoid the conclusion that between Horner's death in 1817 and Raeburn's death in 1823, the artist in Edinburgh was repeatedly painting Francis Horner who lay in a cemetery in Pisa. He painted him both half-length from left or right and three-quarter-length from left or right. Did he perhaps use a version of Chantrey's bust to assist him, in the same way we are told Chantrey used Raeburn's portrait? Did Francis Horner's brother assist Raeburn in the same way as he had assisted Chantrey? We do not know. A contemporary of Francis Horner said after his death that "the ten commandments were written on his face". His popularity as a man, his success as a writer and politician, and his beguiling looks led to interesting and perhaps insoluble art-historical problems.
David Mackie
St. Catharine's College
Cambridge University