Charles Beale the Elder

This portraitback to top

An informal study, probably painted c.1660; the head is finished but the drapery perfunctory.
The identity of Charles Beale, first suggested by Ida Procter in 1951 (verbally), seems confirmed by the warts on the chin and lip and the close similarity with Charles’s head in the family piece of c.1659-60 in the Geffrye Museum (see under Mary Beale).

Provenanceback to top

William Cannon, London, from whom purchased 1900 as an unattributed portrait of Thomas Shadwell.<sup>1

1</sup> A second portrait of Charles Beale was mistaken for Thomas Shadwell.

Exhibitionsback to top

‘The Excellent Mrs Mary Beale’, Geffrye Museum, London, and Towner Art Gallery, Eastbourne, 1975–76, no.3 as c.1663; Gawthorpe Hall, Lancs. 1987–97; Mary Beale, Geffrye Museum, London, 1999–2000, no.2 as c.1660; The Stuart Portrait, Southampton, 2001, no.13.


This extended catalogue entry is from the National Portrait Gallery collection catalogue: John Ingamells, National Portrait Gallery: Later Stuart Portraits 1685–1714, National Portrait Gallery, 2009, and is as published then. For the most up-to-date details on individual Collection works, we recommend reading the information provided in the Search the Collection results on this website in parallel with this text.

View all known portraits for Charles Beale the Elder

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