Portrait of a young girl, George Knapton (London 1698 – 1778), attributable

George Knapton (London 1698 – 1778), attributable
Portrait of a young aristocratic girl sitting near a fountain in a garden in the company of a lamb

Oil on canvas (127 x 102 cm./Framed 143 x 119 cm.)

We show you this splendid example of eighteenth-century English portraiture, which depicts a young girl portrayed in the garden of her estate and sitting near a gushing fountain; one of her hands is placed on the back of a lamb, a convention we often find in portraiture of this period, which harks back to romantic evocations of pastoral simplicity popular in England at the time.

The girl is depicted wearing a silk dress, with sapphire blue shades which, although extremely simple, is very refined and finished with great attention to detail. On her head she wears a white lace hair clip embellished with a rose, and in her hands she holds a bud, while a garland of little flowers encircles the neck of the little lamb at her side.

It is probably the girl's pet but which, in the field of portraiture, also gives the portrait a strong symbolic connotation; in fact, we know that the animal is the iconographic attribute of Saint Agnes, patron saint of virgins and women about to get married, symbolizing her chaste innocence.

It is therefore likely that this painting was therefore commissioned as an engagement portrait.

By carefully scrutinizing the compositional and stylistic details we are inclined to attribute its authorship to the hand of the painter George Knapton (London 1698 – 1778), a highly appreciated London portraitist also known for his pastel paintings as well as oil.

In his career he painted several portraits of children and children of the English aristocracy, very similar in typology to ours.

By way of example we can mention: the 'Portrait of Katherine Miller with her spaniel' (private collection), the 'Portrait of Elizabeth Hatch in a blue dress' (Christie's, London, 08 Jun 2006), the 'Portrait of a girl sitting in a garden' (Sotheby's, London, 30 Nov 2000), 'the 'Portrait of a Girl' (Bonhams, London, 04 Apr 2023), the 'Portrait of William Napier' (Christie's, London, November 1991) and finally the group portrait depicting 'The Second Earl of Egmont and his Sisters in a Landscape' (originally Avon Castle collection, Hampshire).

He was a pupil of Jonathan Richardson from 1715 to 1722 and in 1720 one of the founders of the Academy of St. Martin's Lane together with Louis Chéron and John Vanderbank.

He spent seven years in Italy, from 1725 to 1732, where he acquired considerable knowledge of the old masters and was a founding member of the Society of Dilettanti, established in Rome in the early 1741s, and as an official portraitist he executed between 1749 and XNUMX twenty-three portraits of members of the society in a variety of costumes.

ADDITIONAL INFORMATION:
The painting is sold complete with a pleasant golden frame and is accompanied by a certificate of authenticity and descriptive iconographic card.
We take care of and organize the transport of the purchased works, both for Italy and abroad, through professional and insured carriers.

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