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ANTIQUE #SA1001394

Portrait Of A Gentleman C.1680, By Mary Beale.

£9,850    $12,478    €11,850
A fine portrait by Mary Beale, in its original carved and giltwood frame. The sitter is depicted within a feigned stone oval ... a fashionable conceit much used by Beale and Lely.
 
The canvas is a coarse weave, often used by the artist. It may be ''onion bag'', ''sacking'' or ''Osnabrug'', three of the types mentioned in the notes kept by Mary''s husband, Charles Beale, who organised the purchase of her materials and primed the raw canvases. ''Osnabrug'' was a coarse cloth of linen or hemp, manufactured in Osnabruck in Germany.
 
MARY BEALE (1633-1699) was born in Barrow, Suffolk, the daughter of John Cradock, a Puritan rector. Her mother, Dorothy, died when she was 10. Her father was an amateur painter, and member of the Painter-Stainers'' Company, and she was acquainted with local artists, such as Nathaniel Thach, Matthew Snelling, Robert Walker and Peter Lely. In 1652, at the age of 18, she married Charles Beale, a cloth merchant from London - also an amateur painter.
 
She became a semi-professional portrait painter in the 1650s and 1660s, working from her home, first in Covent Garden and later in Fleet Street. Mary Beale was not the only female painter in England, but her name has survived as that of the only woman to make a successful living, and to enjoy a flourishing practice as a portraitist.
 
She became reacquainted with Sir Peter Lely, now Court Artist to Charles II. Her later work is heavily influenced by Lely, being mainly small portraits. He was Beale’s strongest artistic supporter. The friendship between Lely and Mary Beale enabled her, famously, to observe the master in the act of painting – a remarkable privilege – in order to study his technique. It is perhaps not surprising, therefore, that many of her portraits have been misattributed to Lely or his Studio .She was widely reckoned to be Van Dyck''s most accomplished copyist. Her grasp of Lely''s colouring is evident, but the pleasant and direct manner in which she treats her sitters is enti...
Antique #SA1001394, shown on this page, originates from the 17th century. For historical context, the timeline below highlights the period when it was made:
←C17th
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ROY PRECIOUS - ANTIQUES & FINE ART PROFILE PHOTO WHICH LINKS TO DEALER PAGE
Roy Precious - Antiques & Fine Art
Roy and Nadine Precious: Specialists in portraiture from the 16th to the 20th century. Established in 1972.
Wiltshire
United Kingdom
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