John Chute (1701-1776)
Pompeo Girolamo Batoni (Lucca 1708 – Rome 1787)
Category
Art / Miniatures
Date
1746 (inscribed on reverse)
Materials
Watercolour on ivory
Measurements
60 mm (Length)
Order this imageCollection
Vyne Estate, Hampshire
NT 719373
Caption
John Chute, who inherited The Vyne in 1754, was a talented architect and a close friend of the collector and author, Horace Walpole. John was a member of the ‘Committee of Taste’, a group of friends and experts who helped Walpole with the enlargement and decoration of Strawberry Hill, his house in Twickenham.
Summary
Portrait miniature, watercolour on ivory (oval), John Chute (1701-1776) by Pompeo Girolamo Batoni (Lucca 1708 – Rome 1787), inscribed on the reverse with the name of the sitter and the date 1746. A head-and-shoulders portrait of a man, turned to the right, gazing at the spectator, holding a small magnifying glass in his left hand, wearing a brown coat, blue and yellow waistcoat, white cravat. Blue eyes, grey wig with large black bow in queue, pale complexion with stipple modelling. Brown scumbled background. (One of nine family miniatures in a mahogany case NT/VYN/F/31.)
Provenance
The Tribune, Strawberry Hill; Strawberry Hill sale, (14th day, Lot 13) 10 May 1842 bought by William Wiggett Chute; bequeathed with The Vyne, estate and contents by Sir Charles Chute, 1st Bt (1879-1956).
Makers and roles
Pompeo Girolamo Batoni (Lucca 1708 – Rome 1787), artist
References
Strawberry Hill 1842., p.141 [Lot 13] Burn 1842: J. H. Burn, Aedes Strawberrianae. Names of Purchasers and the Prices to the Sale Catalogue of the Collections of Art and Vertû, at Strawberry Hill formed by Horace Walpole, Earl of Orford , London c.1842, p.35 [Lot 13] Clark and Bowron 1985 Anthony M. Clark & Edgar Peters Bowron (ed.), Pompeo Batoni A Complete Catalogue of his Works with an Introductory Text, Oxford 1985, no. 97