Project Blue Boy will allow visitors to watch and learn about high-tech analysis and treatment of Thomas Gainsborough’s 18th-century masterpiece in the Huntington Art Gallery. One of the most iconic artworks in British and American history, The Blue Boy, made around 1770, undergoes its first major technical examination and conservation treatment in public view, in […]
A new online resource to assist portrait and dress research has been created on the National Portrait Gallery website, utilizing the Gallery’s collection of engraved and hand-coloured fashion plates. One hundred years of mostly women’s fashions from 1770 to 1869 can now be explored by date, by garments, or by the magazine in which the […]
Barings Bank was at one time the oldest merchant bank in the City of London and has played an important role in the development of British and international finance from the late-eighteenth to the late-twentieth century. Barings played a significant role in major historic events, such as, financing the Louisiana Purchase. This exhibition explores the […]
Venue: National Portrait Gallery, King Edward Terrace, Parkes, Canberra, ACT 2600, Australia Until Sunday 22 October 2017 This is the first exhibition to showcase the compelling watercolour images of English street people made by the itinerant English painter John Dempsey throughout the first half of the nineteenth century. Featuring 52 rarely-seen portraits, the exhibition profiles […]
Press release announcement from The Grosvenor Museum, Chester, 21 April 2017: A glamorous portrait of one of Cheshire’s most interesting 20th-century aristocrats has gone on display at Chester’s Grosvenor Museum. The portrait of Sybil, Countess of Rocksavage, later Marchioness of Cholmondeley, was painted by Charles Sims in 1922. The painting was purchased with support from […]
James Gillray (1756-1815) was one of the greatest caricaturist of the 18th century. From around 1775 until 1810, he produced nearly 1,000 prints—including brilliantly finished portrait caricatures of the rich, famous, or frivolous, wonderfully comic caricatures of people being awkward, and unquestionably the best satiric caricatures of British political and social life in the age […]
The Garrick Club in London holds a remarkable collection of art works representing the history of the theatre, much of which is displayed throughout the building. There are over 1,000 paintings, drawings and sculptures, a fascinating selection of theatrical memorabilia, and thousands of prints. The new Collections Online Catalogue has just been launched, and can […]
The British country house has long been regarded as the jewel in the nation’s heritage crown. But the country house is also an expression of wealth and power, and as scholars reconsider the nation’s colonial past, new questions are being posed about these great houses and their links to Atlantic slavery. This book, authored by […]
The Profiles of the Past initiative is focused on British portrait silhouette history, a story that developed over the last 250 years and which is still an intriguing part of life today. The project is being developed by The Brunswick Town Charitable Trust and The Regency Town House Heritage Centre, in co-operation with members of […]
Regular high quality blog posts by Lynn Roberts on the history of picture frames and their iconography – also active on Twitter @TheFrameBlog. Link to The Frame Blog.
