Matthew Boulton

This portraitback to top

NPG 1451 appears to be an original portrait, most closely resembling the medallion by C. H. Küchler. Sarah Brown, whose husband, W. D. Brown (c.1753-1820), was Boulton’s confidential clerk, practised as a wax modeller in Handsworth, Birmingham. [1] Pyke records a pink wax portrait by her, also dated 1807, of a Mr Woodward (possibly the John Woodward remembered in Boulton’s will). [2]

Footnotesback to top

1) See E. J. Pyke, A Biographical Dictionary of Wax Modellers, 1973, p 20.
2) Private collection (illus. E. J. Pyke, A Biographical Dictionary of Wax Modellers, 1973, pl.38).

Provenanceback to top

Purchased from Francis Draper 1906.


This extended catalogue entry is from the out-of-print National Portrait Gallery collection catalogue: John Ingamells, National Portrait Gallery: Mid-Georgian Portraits 1760-1790, National Portrait Gallery, 2004, 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.

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