Painted in the 1780s, this portrait shows a gentleman with a steady gaze, pouting rosebud lips and flushed cheeks wearing a powdered wig neatly tied at the back with ribbon.The portrait is set within a foiled blue glass surround in a gold frame, the reverse with a glazed aperture filled with plaited brown hair. Apart from a couple of short scratches to the glass, the miniature is in fine condition.Writing in ''The Connoisseur'' in 1907, Dr George Williamson described the artist John Donaldson as �surely one of the oddest painters that ever lived�. From humble beginnings (his father made gloves) Donaldson drifted from painting china into portraiture winning early recognition and important prizes from the Society of Arts. After only a few years, however, he developed a fascination for chemistry and wasted his money on failed experiments. He also published a volume of poetry that flopped. Indeed, �his eccentricities were most extraordinary� and his politics most radical that he �m...