John Opie
20 of 896 portraits matching these criteria:
- subject matching 'Making art'
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© National Portrait Gallery, London
Regency Portraits Catalogue
John Opie
by John Opie
1785
29 1/4 in. x 24 1/2 in. (743 mm x 622 mm)
NPG 47
Inscriptionback to top
The original canvas, relined, was inscribed: I. Opie/Pictor/1785 (tracing by Scharf 18 March 1867 in registered packet 47, and see Sir George Scharf’s Trustees’ Sketchbooks, XI, 54).
This portraitback to top
The portrait is one of a series of self-portraits Opie painted from his youth until the end of his life, mainly as experiments in various styles. NPG 47 shows him aged 24; a variant without palette and brushes, painted in a looser technique, was lent by Mrs Romney Fox to Plymouth 1962-3 (38).
Physical descriptionback to top
Half-length to left with brush and palette, dark grey coat, white neckcloth and shirt-frill; long dark brown hair in fringe, grey eyes, fresh complexion, full lips; plain dark brown background.
Exhibitionsback to top
'Opie and Bone', Truro, 1951; 'John Opie RA', Plymouth, 1957; 'John Opie', Arts Council, 1962-3, catalogues by Mary Peter.
Reproductionsback to top
Stipple by Ridley in The European Magazine, 1 December 1798.
This extended catalogue entry is from the out-of-print National Portrait Gallery collection catalogue: Richard Walker, Regency Portraits, National Portrait Gallery, 1985, 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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