James Clay, MP (1804-1873)
British (English) School
Category
Art / Oil paintings
Date
circa 1830 - 1835
Materials
Oil on canvas
Measurements
762 x 813 mm (30 x 32 in)
Order this imageCollection
Hughenden, Buckinghamshire
NT 428983
Summary
Oil painting on canvas, James Clay, MP (1804-1873), British School, circa 1830/35. Black double-breasted coat buttoned high with red and white flower in buttonhole. Two rings on right hand, one on left. A nearly three-quarter length portrait of Clay as a young man, seated slightly right, in red upholstered chair, head facing, wearing black, red and white (party?) favour pinned to his bust. The sitter was a contemporary of Ralph Disraeli's at Winchester, and of William George Meredith's at Oxford, whom they met at Malta, and who became their travelling-companion in the Levant, in 1830-31, despite the disapproval of Disraeli's family. As Robert Blake memorably puts it ('Disraeli, 1966, p.62): "Clay was a handsome youth, with the complexion of a ripe peach. He had two other assets - he had chartered a 55-ton yacht, 'The Susan', and had acquired Byron's former servant, 'Tita ' Falcieri. Clay was an amusing and witty companion, but, although he later became a liberal MP and an authority on whist - achievements which seem respectable enough - he was at this stage of life a shameless roue and an unceasing pursuer of women." And Blake concludes: "their relations remained intimate long after this. They were in secret communication over the Reform Bill of 1867, and during Clay's last illness in 1873, Disraeli called every day at his house."
Provenance
According to a label on the back, recording the statement in Disraeli's own list of June 1879, when the picture hung on the Staircase, presented to Disraeli by the sitter's sons; still hung there (near the bottom) in the 1881 inventory (no.131 - curiously, not declared an Heirloom); given to the National Trust with Hughenden Manor by the Disraelian Society, 1947
Makers and roles
British (English) School, artist previously catalogued as attributed to Archibald James Stuart-Wortley (1849 - Uxbridge 1905) , artist