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Lot Essay
We are grateful to David Mackie, St Catharine's College, University of Cambridge, for his assistance in cataloguing this lot.
This painting is almost certainly identical with a portrait seen by John Brown, a Scottish man of letters, when he visited the Raeburn family to see their collection of paintings by their grandfather at their home in Midcalder, Lothians, in c. 1873. Brown said of it: 'In a bedroom … Head of a Gentleman in a richly-toned blue coat - capital: he is powdered, and is holding his hat, in the inside of which you see the powder, done to perfection. Raeburn could never paint his men in fancy dresses, he used to say they should have the clothes of their time.' That portrait was later lent by the Raeburn family to the Raeburn Exhibition 1876 (55) where it was described in the catalogue again as Gentleman with a Hat. At a later date, in or before 1916, the title Sir William Napier seems to have become attached to the picture for reasons that are not clear. The style of the portrait suggests a probable date for sittings in the late 1790s. But at that date Sir William Napier (1785-1860) was still a child. The portrait is perhaps best described using the old title, Gentleman in a Hat. It was one of the earliest portraits by Raeburn to enter an American public collection.
The portrait will be included in the forthcoming complete catalogue of Raeburn to be published by the Paul Mellon Centre, London, and Yale University Press.
This painting is almost certainly identical with a portrait seen by John Brown, a Scottish man of letters, when he visited the Raeburn family to see their collection of paintings by their grandfather at their home in Midcalder, Lothians, in c. 1873. Brown said of it: 'In a bedroom … Head of a Gentleman in a richly-toned blue coat - capital: he is powdered, and is holding his hat, in the inside of which you see the powder, done to perfection. Raeburn could never paint his men in fancy dresses, he used to say they should have the clothes of their time.' That portrait was later lent by the Raeburn family to the Raeburn Exhibition 1876 (55) where it was described in the catalogue again as Gentleman with a Hat. At a later date, in or before 1916, the title Sir William Napier seems to have become attached to the picture for reasons that are not clear. The style of the portrait suggests a probable date for sittings in the late 1790s. But at that date Sir William Napier (1785-1860) was still a child. The portrait is perhaps best described using the old title, Gentleman in a Hat. It was one of the earliest portraits by Raeburn to enter an American public collection.
The portrait will be included in the forthcoming complete catalogue of Raeburn to be published by the Paul Mellon Centre, London, and Yale University Press.