Titan Fine Art has dated this piece to the 16th Century.
This period produced a style of painting quite unlike that anywhere else in Europe and one that deserves serious assessment.
The motivation for portraiture during this period was not aesthetic, but rather dynastic - a means to record ancestors. For most individuals the idea of a painting as a work of art perhaps never existed; it was primarily an expression of rank and class. There is not a huge milieu of works remaining from this age and it must also be noted that of the two percent of the population that made up the gentry classes, many would have owned no portraits at all.
Just a couple of years after our portrait was painted, from about 1590, English painting developed on another course, driven mainly by the artists Marcus Gheeraerts the Younger and Isaac Oliver; they depicted a new mood that was pervading Elizabethan and Jacobean society, which was that of romantic melancholy. Elizabethan painting came to an end when Henry, Prince of Wales, sought a complete change of style of his father’s court. In 1610 and 1612 he gathered the talent needed to do just that and invited the Dutch painter Miereveldt, who was seen as the perfect proponent for an updated style, to England.
The portrait is emblazoned with the coat of arms of the Vavasour family - great landowners in Yorkshire and Lincolnshire for centuries; their history dates to Norman times. Their main seat was Hazlewood Castle, near Tadcaster, from the time of the Domesday Book until 1908. The Vavasours are of Anglo-Norman descent and the various branches of the family are said to have descended from William le Vavasour. During the years between the English Reformation up until the Catholic Emancipation, the Vavasours were noted as a recusant family for remaining staunchly Catholic but they largely escaped persecution and retained their property and wealth.
The sitter is probably Sir Thomas Vavasour (1560-1620) who was a member of Elizabethan Parliaments. Sir Thomas was the oldest son of Henry Vavasour of Copmanthorpe, Yorks. and Margaret Knyvet. He married Mary Dodge and the couple had four sons and two daughters. His sister, Anne, was Gentlewoman of the Bedchamber about 1580. In 1585 he fought in the Netherlands as Captain of Foot from Yorkshire and again two years later. He is thought to have been knighted before August 1595. His final years were spent at Richmond Palace. After the accession of James I, Vavasour was made Butler of the Port of London and in 1604 he was appointed Knight Marshal of the Household. Vavasour is credited with the building of Ham House in 1610.
Oil on oak panel in carved and parcel gilt frame. On the reverse is a seal in red wax.
Hieronimo Custodis (Hieronymus, Heironimos) was a Flemish portrait painter active in England in the reign of Elizabeth I. His signed works begin in 1587 and it is thought that he came to England around 1585 at the fall of Antwerp to the Duke of Parma. In 1589 he lived in Hogg Lane “neare the (Higstriete) barres” and was described as a 'picturemaker' or 'portrature maker'. It has been documented that Sir Arthur Throckmorton referred to him as a portraitist: “Jeronimo' was paid £ 4 for a portrait of his pregnant wife Anne.
He married Catharina van Herssale (from Brussels). Their daughter, Susanna, was baptised on 2 February 1589 at St. Botolph without Aldgate, and their son, Jacobus was baptised on 2 March 1591. He joined the Dutch Church Austin Friars on 29 October 1592 and was actively working up to 1593, which is presumably the year of his death, as his widow remarried that same year. HIs work is easily identified.
Titan Fine Art has dated this piece to the 16th Century.
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Elizabethan Portrait of Thomas Vavasour in a Black Doublet C.1587; Attributed to Hieronymus Custodis (Died 1593), Oil on Oak Panel Painting
