Nymph and Piping Boy
Sir Joshua Reynolds PRA (Plympton 1723 - London 1792)
Category
Art / Oil paintings
Date
circa 1785 - 1786
Materials
Oil on canvas, and giltwood
Measurements
1270 x 1016 mm (50 x 40 in)
Place of origin
England
Order this imageCollection
Polesden Lacey, Surrey
NT 1246450
Caption
Based on erotic Venetian Renaissance and French Rococo models, this picture is one of several slightly different versions of this composition by Reynolds. Rarely content merely to repeat a pictorial idea, the artist incorporated small but significant modifications into each reprisal of the subject. This restless approach extended to his experimental approach to the physical make-up of his pictures which has resulted here in severe cracking.
Summary
Oil painting on canvas, Nymph and Piping Boy by Sir Joshua Reynolds (Plympton 1723 - London 1792), circa 1785-6. The female nude reclines at the left on white and yellow drapery under a red canopy in a wooded landscape; she wears a wreath of flowers in her hair and looks towards a boy dressed in red velvet, who is seated at the right playing a pipe.
Provenance
John Julius Angerstein (1735 - 1823) - mentioned in his house, Woodlands, at Blackheath in 1796- see Lyson's 'Environs of London', IV, p. 462; Sir Cuthbert Quilter (1841-1911) before 1891; his sale, Christie's, 9 July 1909, lot 93, bought by Agnew for C.S. Gulbenkian (1869 - 1955) and bought back 11.7.1914; sold to Mrs Greville for £7,410, 12.12.1917; The bequest of Margaret (Anderson) McEwan, The Hon. Mrs Ronald - later Dame Margaret - Henry Fulke Greville, DBE (1863-1942) from probate records linked with the donation of the property to the National Trust in 1943. This item found on the record for Polesden Lacey pictures, drawings etc., the Gun Room Lavatory, page 132.
Credit line
Polesden Lacey, The McEwan Collection (National Trust)
Makers and roles
Sir Joshua Reynolds PRA (Plympton 1723 - London 1792), artist
References
Lysons 1792 Daniel Lysons, The Environs of London, London, 1792, IV, p. 462 Mannings 2000: David Mannings, Sir Joshua Reynolds: A Complete Catalogue of his Paintings. The Subject Pictures catalogued by Martin Postle, New Haven & London 2000, 2176, p. 572
