Collection Online as of September 29, 2022
Portrait of a Man
Richard Cosway
(British, 1742–1821)
Watercolor on ivory in a gold frame with blue and white enamel
Framed: 5.9 x 5 cm (2 5/16 x 1 15/16 in.); Unframed: 5 x 4 cm (1 15/16 x 1 9/16 in.)
The Edward B. Greene Collection 1942.1137
Location
not on view
Description
Painted during the early part of Richard Cosway’s mature career, this portrait of an unknown man exhibits the artist’s characteristic proportionality, with head enlarged in relation to the shoulders and eyes enlarged in relation to the rest of the face. The effect is to draw the viewer’s attention to the sitter’s eyes, which heightens the already intimate experience of looking at a miniature.
This young sitter wears a high collar popular in the late 1780s and has powdered his hair, worn en queue rather than wearing a wig, which by 1790 was used primarily by older, conservative men.
Measuring under 2 inches high, this miniature is modest in size for Cosway during this period, when the format of his miniatures expanded to 3 inches. Factors such as size, elaborateness of costume, and how much of the body was depicted all determined how much an artist would charge for a miniature. Smaller miniatures were obviously more portable and adaptable to being worn as jewelry.
Richard Cosway
Richard Cosway was Arguably the most fashionable miniature painter in London during the art form’s golden age in
late-eighteenth-century Britain. Also an accomplished painter in oils, Cosway was equally well known for his flamboyant character and the stunning art collection that secured his reputation as an arbiter of taste and model of connoisseurship. His elegant portraits in miniature were coveted by sitters who sought glamour even if it was at the expense of truthfulness. Cosway and his wife, Maria (neé Hadfield), maintained an elite circle of friends who helped define what
was au courant for the age and who consisted primarily of cultural luminaries and young members of high society revolving around George Augustus Frederick, the prince of Wales himself. His steady patronage from 1780 until 1808 fixed Cosway’s popularity within fashionable society. From 1785 Cosway’s miniatures were signed on the back: “Primarius Pictor Serenissimi Walliae Principis” (Principal Painter to His Royal Highness the Prince of Wales), a pompous Latin designation that garnered the artist both fame and ridicule. Cosway was a successful artist-celebrity in his own time, and, in spite of being criticized periodically for being too superficially pretty, his miniatures have always been among the most desired by collectors. The Cleveland Museum of Art owns five miniatures by Cosway, painted between 1785 and 1805, that are representative of the artist’s stylistic range during the height of his career.
late-eighteenth-century Britain. Also an accomplished painter in oils, Cosway was equally well known for his flamboyant character and the stunning art collection that secured his reputation as an arbiter of taste and model of connoisseurship. His elegant portraits in miniature were coveted by sitters who sought glamour even if it was at the expense of truthfulness. Cosway and his wife, Maria (neé Hadfield), maintained an elite circle of friends who helped define what
was au courant for the age and who consisted primarily of cultural luminaries and young members of high society revolving around George Augustus Frederick, the prince of Wales himself. His steady patronage from 1780 until 1808 fixed Cosway’s popularity within fashionable society. From 1785 Cosway’s miniatures were signed on the back: “Primarius Pictor Serenissimi Walliae Principis” (Principal Painter to His Royal Highness the Prince of Wales), a pompous Latin designation that garnered the artist both fame and ridicule. Cosway was a successful artist-celebrity in his own time, and, in spite of being criticized periodically for being too superficially pretty, his miniatures have always been among the most desired by collectors. The Cleveland Museum of Art owns five miniatures by Cosway, painted between 1785 and 1805, that are representative of the artist’s stylistic range during the height of his career.