Joseph Gibbs

© National Portrait Gallery, London

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Joseph Gibbs

by Thomas Gainsborough
oil on canvas, circa 1755
23 7/8 in. x 19 3/4 in. (606 mm x 502 mm)
Purchased, 1928
Primary Collection
NPG 2179

On display at Gainsborough's House, Sudbury

Sitterback to top

  • Joseph Gibbs (1699-1788), Organist and composer. Sitter in 1 portrait.

Artistback to top

  • Thomas Gainsborough (1727-1788), Portrait and landscape painter. Artist or producer associated with 268 portraits, Sitter in 8 portraits.

This portraitback to top

Here Gibbs is shown composing a Sonata, with volumes of music by the Italian composers Geminiani and Corelli beside him. In the 1750s when this portrait was made Gainsborough and Joseph Gibbs were both members of the Ipswich Musical Club. Gainsborough's portraits of his musician friends are among his most sensitive, reflecting his own love of music; according to an obituary he 'thought he was not intended by nature for a painter, but a musician'. More detailed information on this portrait is available in a National Portrait Gallery collection catalogue, John Kerslake's Early Georgian Portraits (1977, out of print).

Linked publicationsback to top

Events of 1755back to top

Current affairs

George Grenville resigns as Treasurer of the Navy and Henry Bilson Legge as Chancellor of the Exchequer in protest over payments made to Russia to protect Hanover. William Pitt the Elder is dismissed from the position of Paymaster of the Forces.

Art and science

Samuel Johnson publishes his monumental Dictionary; the first authoritative dictionary of the English language.
Methodist preacher John Wesley publishes Notes on a New Testament.

International

An earthquake nearly completely destroys Lisbon, Portugal. The event is widely discussed by European Enlightenment thinkers, inspiring Voltaire's Candide. Its intensive study leads to the birth of modern seismology and earthquake engineering.
Edward Braddock fights French and Indian troops in the Ohio valley. His army are ambushed at Fort Duquesne and he is killed; one of several encounters prior to the declaration of the Seven Years War.

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Rachel Harris

10 July 2018, 23:15

The music and page number in the painting is identical (apart from missing accidentals) to a sonata by Michael Festing, Op 7 no. 1, published in 1744. Gibbs is listed as subscriber. Here is a link to the music on imslp: https://imslp.org/wiki/6_Violin_Sonatas%2C_Op.7_(Festing%2C_Michael_Christian)