Later Victorian Portraits Catalogue

Stanhope Alexander Forbes (1857-1947), Genre painter

Self-portraits
By other artists
Photographs

Self-portraitsback to top


1882
Oil on board, 220 x 150mm, signed and dated on board purchased in London, head-and-shoulders to front, slight moustache; untraced; Whyte’s, 27 Apr. 2004 (116, ill.).

1883
Pen and ink caricature drawing in a letter, Dec. 1883, inscr. ‘Singular attempt to cross the Channel by a young artist’, half-length at oars of boat with stretched canvas for sail; Tate Archive, TGA 9015. Repr. Cross 1994, p.48.

1889
Oil on canvas, head-and-shoulders, profile to right, dark hair, wing collar; Newlyn AG. Repr. Cross 1994, p.80.

1890
Oil on canvas, signed and dated lower left, head-and-shoulders, half-profile to left, wearing tam-o’-shanter; Penlee House GM, Penzance, NELNG: 1991.13.

1891
Oil on canvas, 335 x 292mm, head-and-shoulders, slightly to left; Aberdeen AG, ABDAG002561.


By other artistsback to top


c.1887
Engr. by unidentified artist, three-quarter-length, profile to right, standing at easel painting Their Ever-Shifting Home (RA 1887) in his garden at Newlyn; repr. AJ, 1892, p.66.

1890
Pencil and watercolour caricature drawing, 330 x 220mm, by Frederick Hall, signed and dated by artist, signed by sitter, three-quarter-length, profile to left, standing, wearing hat and ‘the long coat that Mr Forbes affects’; offered to NPG 1975; Tate Archive, TGA 7511/4. Exh. Fred Hall: Paintings of the Countryside, Fry G., London, 1975 (no.iv in series of ‘Newlyn School Personalities’); repr. Black & White, 27 June 1891, p.671; and Cross 1994, p.43 (colour).

1890s
Watercolour and charcoal drawing, 432 x 406mm, by Elizabeth Adela Forbes; untraced; Forbes studio sale, 1981 (66). Ref. Cook & Hardie 2000, no.4.239.

Charcoal drawing, 330 x 152mm, by Elizabeth Adela Forbes, three-quarter-length, standing holding palette, drawn by firelight?; untraced; sold W.H. Lane, Penzance, 16 Oct. 1986 (525). Ref. Cook & Hardie 2000, no.4.242; repr. Birch 1906, facing p.8.

Oil on board, 235 x 146mm, by Elizabeth Adela Forbes, three-quarter-length, profile to left, seated playing cello; priv. coll. Repr. Cook & Hardie 2000, no.4.241, p.67.

1901 or before
Oil on panel by Elizabeth Adela Forbes; see NPG 6587.

1912 or before
Oil on board, 302 x 254mm, by Elizabeth Adela Forbes, three-quarter-length, looking forward, standing holding large umbrella; priv. coll. Repr. Cook & Hardie 2000, no.4.244, p.68.

Watercolour drawing, 550 x 150mm, by Elizabeth Adela Forbes; untraced; listed as ‘SAF in Cranford’ in MS ‘Catalogue of Pictures by Elizabeth Forbes’, Tate Archives (Forbes), 9015.5.7/14.

1915
Oil on canvas, 615 x 515mm, by George Clausen, head-and-shoulders to left, clean-shaven, wearing dark jacket and tie; RA, London, 03/597 (where described as ‘probably privately commissioned from Clausen by Forbes’s second wife Maud Clayton Palmer, whom he married the same year’).

before 1947
Oil on canvas by Maude Clayton Forbes; untraced. Exh. RA 1948 (615); and probably St Ives Society of Artists, Swindon, 1949 (see Cornwall Artists Index: Maude C. Stanhope Forbes).

Doubtful portrait
Oil on canvas, 533 x 452mm, by John Richards, half-length, profile to right, hands resting on walking stick; untraced. Repr. Bonhams, 26 June 1986 (8), but sitter is bearded and no other portraits of Forbes show him thus.

Posthumous portrait

1948
Bronze medallion by A.G. Wyon, head, three-quarter profile to right; exterior wall, Newlyn AG. Repr. Hardie 1995, pp.94, 96.


Photographsback to top


c.1884
Photographs by unidentified photographer, in group of Newlyn artists, three known poses:
(a) nearly whole-length, seated, wearing deerstalker, legs crossed to left; repr. Cross 1994, p.55.
(b) whole-length, seated on ground, rest of group standing or sitting on bench; Penlee House GM, Penzance. Repr. Brotherhood of
the Palette
leaflet, Penlee House GM, Penzance, 2009.
(c) whole-length, standing, turning to camera, left hand on hip, on far right of group; Penlee House GM, Penzance; repr. www.penleehouse.org.uk.

c.1886
Photograph by unidentified photographer, whole-length, standing in studio to left of his painting Off to the Fishing Grounds (1886); repr. www.penleehouse.org.uk.

Photograph by unidentified photographer, nearly whole-length, profile to right wearing overcoat and hat, standing outdoors with large canvas, right arm outstretched, painting Their Ever-Shifting Home (1887); Cornish Studies Library (TR15 2AT). Repr. British Art Journal, vol.13, no1. 2012, p.72

c.1890
Photograph by unidentified photographer, in Newlyn cricket team group, whole-length, seated, legs crossed, wearing deerstalker; repr. Cross 1994, p.154.

before 1892
Photograph by Vandyk, quarter-length, profile to left, no moustache, wearing wing collar; repr. AJ, 1892, p.66.

publ. 1892
Photograph by unidentified photographer, head-and-shoulders, full-face looking to left, large moustache and wing collar; engr. by ‘RT’ repr. ILN, 6 Feb. 1892, p.163 (marking election ARA); also repr. as thumbnail head, ‘The Pictures of 1892’, Pall Mall Gazette ‘Extra’, no.62, 2 May 1892, p.16.

Photograph by Ralph Winwood Robinson, Redhill, three-quarter-length, looking forward, seated to right, legs crossed, large moustache; reg. for copyright 1895 May 14: National Archives (COPY 1/420/450); repr. Robinson [1892]; and MA, 1892, p.181.

c.1892
Photograph by Robinson & Thompson, Liverpool, in group of seven men, inscr. with name of William Stott of Oldham and signatures of four others incl. Forbes, whole-length, half-profile to left, seated; Tate Archive, 9015.9.2. Repr. London 1998, p.68 (as ‘Hanging Committee Liverpool Autumn Exhibition’).

c.1897
Photograph by Elliott & Fry, half-length, profile to left, moustache, wing collar, arms crossed; repr. The Year’s Art 1897, facing p.20; and Rosenblum, Stevens & Dumas 2000, p.384.

1890s
Prints by unidentified photographers, six known poses:
(a) whole-length, profile to left, standing at workbench and vice in forge used as studio.
(b) whole-length, profile to right, standing bringing hammer down on anvil.
(c) professional print, head-and-shoulders, wide moustache.
(d) whole-length, seated in drawing room (photo cropped so only back, back of head and one heel visible).
(e) whole-length, reclining on window seat, reading.
(f) three-quarter-length, no moustache, standing in front of painting of Newlyn band [?Salvation Army], holding palette and wearing tam-o’-shanter.
All in album inscr. ‘Mr and Mrs Stanhope Forbes / a souvenir of Newlyn / and of M.J.W & W.R.W’; Tate Archive, 9015.9.1/1.

Photograph by unidentified photographer, in group of Newlyn Players, three-quarter-length, standing wearing policeman costume; repr. Cross 1994, p.123.

1900s
Bromide matt print, 163 x 111mm, by unidentified photographer, signed by sitter, three-quarter-length, standing with palette in studio before painting of woman and child; NPG x13993. Repr. Warner 1997, p.222 (cropped).

1909
Photograph by unidentified photographer, whole-length, profile to left, standing at work on canvas with palette, brush and easel, outside cottage, wearing hat and greatcoat with rear view of woman in background; priv. coll. Repr. C. Fox, Painting in Newlyn 1900–1930, Penzance, 1985, p.34 (where captioned ‘Stanhope Forbes photographed painting February Sunshine 1909. From a photograph in a private collection.’).

1931
Photograph by unidentified photographer, three-quarter-length to front, standing before painting in exhibition; repr. St Ives Times, 4 Dec. 1931; and Tovey 2003, p.91.

1934
Vintage prints by Felix H. Man, two known poses:
(a) 250 x 182mm, whole-length, half-profile to left, with moustache, standing with palette, easel and sun umbrella in garden; NPG x68228. Repr. Tovey 2003, p.46.
(b) 296 x 245mm, whole-length to front, standing in studio with seated wife and lapdog before painting of carters hauling large block of stone; NPG x68229.

?1930s
Photograph by unidentified photographer, half-length, half-profile to right, standing holding palette and brush before painting of roadway; repr. in unidentified newspaper with headline ‘R.A.Works among the Flowers’ (cutting in NPG SB [Forbes]); and Hardie 1995, between pp.64–5.

1940s
Photograph by unidentified photographer, half-length, standing among paintings; repr. West Briton Advertiser, 6 Mar. 1947.

1946
Photograph by unidentified photographer, 18 Nov. 1946, sitter’s 89th birthday, head-and-shoulders, profile to left; repr. in unidentified newspaper, 1947 (cutting in NPG SB [Forbes]).


Undated photograph
Photograph by unidentified photographer, whole-length, rear view, wearing soft hat, at easel in cobbled street, women and children in background; repr. Cross 1994, p.50; and Sotheby’s, 27 Nov. 2003 (31, fig.1 uncredited). The work on the easel appears to be A Street in Newlyn (1885; Penlee House MG, Penzance), which depicts a woman and girl in traditional fisherwoman costume, like two subsidiary figures in the photograph. But Forbes’s soft hat and loose jacket suggest a later date, and it is more likely that the photograph was carefully staged to show the artist as if at work on site.

Dr Jan Marsh