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Lot Essay
The present work is one of three versions of a portrait by Reynolds of the Reverend Zachariah Mudge (1694-1769).
The sitter was the vicar of St. Andrew's, Plymouth, and Prebendary of Exeter (1736). He married Mary Fox in 1714, by whom he had four sons and a daughter, and secondly, in 1762, Elizabeth Neell (d.1782).
Mudge came to know Reynolds when he was working as second master to the artist's father, the Revd. Samuel Reynolds, at Exeter Grammar School in 1713. They were to form a life-long friendship, and James Northcote reported that Reynolds referred to Mudge as 'the wisest man he had ever met in his life' (Northcote, vol. I, p.115). He was particularly influenced by Mudge's interpretation of Platonic philosophy, opining that beauty subsisted purely as an idea within the mind.
The sitter was the vicar of St. Andrew's, Plymouth, and Prebendary of Exeter (1736). He married Mary Fox in 1714, by whom he had four sons and a daughter, and secondly, in 1762, Elizabeth Neell (d.1782).
Mudge came to know Reynolds when he was working as second master to the artist's father, the Revd. Samuel Reynolds, at Exeter Grammar School in 1713. They were to form a life-long friendship, and James Northcote reported that Reynolds referred to Mudge as 'the wisest man he had ever met in his life' (Northcote, vol. I, p.115). He was particularly influenced by Mudge's interpretation of Platonic philosophy, opining that beauty subsisted purely as an idea within the mind.