The Exhibition Age 1760–1815
17 rooms in Historic and Early Modern British Art
The first public exhibitions bring new audiences and new status to British art. This gallery recreates the spectacle of these early displays
The first temporary exhibition of contemporary art opens in London in 1760. Many more soon follow, notably the annual summer exhibitions held from 1769 by the new Royal Academy. For the thousands of visitors attending, these exhibitions can be overwhelming, unruly experiences. Noisy, hot and overcrowded, people come for the spectacle as much as for the art. They are as bursting with paintings as with people. As in this room, the pictures are densely hung from floor to ceiling in a kaleidoscope of styles and subjects.
For artists, this brings new challenges and opportunities. They worry that their work cannot be seen properly in the crowded conditions. To stand out against the competition, they bring ever greater individuality, experimentation and even flamboyance to their work. Art becomes regularly talked about in the newspapers, and reviews from critics can make or break careers.
Exhibitions become fashionable events. Artists are able to directly address more people than ever before, beyond a small number of elite patrons. To engage this wider public, their work often reflects popular interests and current affairs. Exhibitions become places where the nation’s ideas and anxieties are expressed.
There is a new buzz around British art. A sense of national identity is projected through these exhibitions. They help define a ‘British school’, which is celebrated as a sign of the nation’s cultural wealth and progress. Exhibitions contribute to how the country imagines itself on the world stage.
Thomas Stothard, Nymphs Discover the Narcissus exhibited 1793
Thomas Stothard depicts a scene here from the Roman poet Ovid’s mythological narrative, Metamorphoses. The boy Narcissus, obsessed with his own reflection in the water, wastes away and turns into a flower. Here a group of nymphs discover the flower growing on the riverbank. The painting was first exhibited at the Royal Academy in 1793. Stothard’s steadiest form of income was book illustration, but his reputation as a history painter was beginning to grow in the 1790s. It was on this basis that he was elected a full member of the Royal Academy in 1794.
Gallery label, October 2023
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artworks in The Exhibition Age
William Mulready, The Rattle exhibited 1808
Mulready was the son of Irish immigrants. He began exhibiting in London in 1803, and specialised in scenes of everyday life.
This rare, early work shows a man offering a rattle to a small child; the man's face reflects the child's delight. Within a small space, Mulready constructs a complex composition of receding vistas. The view from the parlour hung with pictures to the workshop beyond, suggests different conditions of life and prosperity. The sober colouring and meticulous execution reflect Mulready's study of Dutch painting, especially the work of Pieter de Hooch.
Gallery label, September 2004
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artworks in The Exhibition Age
Maria Spilsbury, The Schoolmistress c.1803
A young woman in white is shown teaching the children gathered around her. One boy sits absorbed in reading A Pilgrim’s Progress, by John Bunyan. The Christian message of this book is reinforced by the church seen in the distance. Maria Spilsbury often portrayed women in such nurturing roles, reflecting the importance of women educators at this time. Women were especially active in the growing Sunday School movement, which aimed to educate working-class children on Sundays, their one day off. Spilsbury also painted a larger version of this picture (with more overt Christian symbolism) and probably exhibited one of these at the Royal Academy in 1804. At that time, her work was reputedly so popular that carriages would queue outside her London studio.
Gallery label, October 2023
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artworks in The Exhibition Age
John Hoppner, Mrs Williams c.1790
Little is known about the woman in this painting. She is thought to have been the wife of a Captain Williams. John Hoppner portrays her in her youth, possibly before her marriage. Hoppner was a skilled colourist, demonstrated in Mrs William’s rosy cheeks and the blue trimmings of her bonnet and blouse. He first exhibited at the Royal Academy in 1780. While he was initially interested in landscape painting, Hoppner soon turned to portraiture which provided a steadier source of income. He achieved considerable success, receiving commissions from numerous aristocrats and members of the royal family.
Gallery label, October 2023
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artworks in The Exhibition Age
Richard Wilson, On Hounslow Heath ?exhibited 1770
The view shows the watermeadows beside the River Crane. This area of Hounslow Heath was not known for its beauty or cultural significance. Instead, the attraction of this picture lies in the beauty of the sky and the reflections in the water. In this it is an example of a new type of landscape view, designed to bring a vision of a rural idyll into the city dweller's home. The picture was commissioned by Tom Davies, who was a Bloomsbury bookseller, and one of a growing number of middle-class urban patrons of English landscape subjects.
Gallery label, September 2004
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artworks in The Exhibition Age
Richard Westall, The Reconciliation of Helen and Paris after his Defeat by Menelaus exhibited 1805
In Greek legend, the beautiful Helen was the wife of Menelaus, king of Sparta. Her affair with the Trojan prince, Paris, led to the Trojan War.Westall painted this picture for Thomas Hope, a fabulously wealthy collector of the antique and of selected contemporary art. Hope’s taste ran from strict neo-classicism to Romantic exoticism. The rooms of his London house were furnished and decorated to reflect various regions of the ancient world – Egypt and India as well as Greece and Rome. Westall modelled the figure of Helen on a Greek statue in Hope’s collection.
Gallery label, May 2007
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artworks in The Exhibition Age
Edward Penny, The Gossiping Blacksmith exhibited 1769
Edward Penny was the first Professor of Painting at the Royal Academy (founded in 1768). This painting was displayed in the Academy’s first exhibition the following year. It illustrates lines from Shakespeare’s King John, which were also printed in the exhibition catalogue: ‘I saw a smith stand with his hammer thus, The whilst his iron did on the anvil cool, With open mouth swallow a taylor’s news.’ Paintings with Shakesperian themes were increasingly popular in the 18th Century. They appealed to a sense of national pride for many of the people who flocked to attend art exhibitions.
Gallery label, October 2023
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artworks in The Exhibition Age
Joseph Mallord William Turner, The Garreteer’s Petition exhibited 1809
Turner rarely painted explicitly figurative works, but was inspired to do so in this case by rivalry with David Wilkie, whose genre subjects had taken the London art world by storm in 1805. The scene shows a young poet struggling for inspiration late at night in his attic room. On the wall is an image of Mount Parnassus, home of the Greek Muses, indicating his lofty ambitions. Though the point of the image seems to be satirical, the picture was exhibited at a time when Turner was producing his own verses, and he may well have sympathised with the poet’s plight.
Gallery label, August 2004
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artworks in The Exhibition Age
Sir Nathaniel Dance-Holland, The Meeting of Dido and Aeneas exhibited 1766
This picture shows the meeting of the Trojan prince Aeneas and the Carthaginian queen Dido, from Virgil’s epic poem, the Aeneid. Aeneas was shipwrecked near Carthage after the sack of Troy. The goddess Venus made Dido fall in love with him and helped him to hide in her citadel. He watches Dido welcome his fellow Trojans and when she asks to see their ‘king’ the mist clears and Aeneas reveals his identity. Dance-Holland made this picture while he was in Rome and sent it to London to be exhibited as a way to advertise his imminent return to Britain.
Gallery label, February 2016
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artworks in The Exhibition Age
Francis Cotes, Portrait of a Lady 1768
This elegant and ornamental portrait
is a fine example of Cotes's style, which emphasises fashion rather than character. The sitter, whose identity is uncertain, sits on a garden bench in an artificial yet striking pose. Her gown and its lace are arranged decoratively about her, the pink and white colouring echoed by the foxgloves behind her, and the roses on the left. The portrait was painted in 1768, the same year as the foundation of the Royal Academy. Cotes was one of its founder members, which his prominent signature on the tree trunk, 'F Cotes RA px', proudly announces.
Gallery label, February 2010
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artworks in The Exhibition Age
John Opie, The School Mistress 1784
This was the painting that established Opie’s reputation in London. It created a sensation when it was shown at the Royal Academy’s annual exhibition in 1784 as ‘The School’. Opie’s handling of paint evoked the most highly-admired Old Masters, like Rembrandt and Caravaggio. What contemporary viewers found remarkable was the combination of realism and dramatic light and shade. This was wholly original, particularly in the context of such an ordinary scene. The school mistress is modelled on Opie’s own mother.
Gallery label, October 2019
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artworks in The Exhibition Age
Henry Robert Morland, A Laundry Maid Ironing c.1765–82
This painting of a maid ironing is typical for Morland, who specialised in such ‘fancy pictures’ - subjects drawn from everyday life but with imaginative elements. He repeatedly painted and exhibited idealised pictures of young women in working-class roles, as ballad singers, oyster sellers and laundry maids. Here, the woman is shown passively gazing down, serene as she works, her tools and appearance pristine. There is little indication of her individuality, or of the real hardship of such domestic labour. Instead, she represents a contrived ‘type’, made attractive for contemporary middle and upper-class viewers and saleable for the print market.
Gallery label, June 2022
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artworks in The Exhibition Age
Henry Walton, A Girl Buying a Ballad exhibited 1778
The distant war for American independence (1775–1782) had an immense and divisive effect on London opinion, which was often very sympathetic to the American cause. There were, of course, many satirical prints, both for and against the Americans.
The war also occasionally had an indirect presence in paintings of contemporary life. The prints displayed by the ballad seller in Walton’s painting include a portrait of General Sir William Howe, commander-in-chief of the British forces in America. He had complained about government interference in the war and had resigned his commission.
Gallery label, September 2004
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artworks in The Exhibition Age
Francis Holman, A Dockyard at Wapping c.1780–4
Little is known about the artist Francis Holman. He was a painter of seascapes, ship's portraits and dockyard scenes, such as this small private dockyard on the Thames at Wapping. It is recorded that at one time Holman lived at Wapping, so he would have been intimate with the area and well able to execute this topographically accurate scene. He depicts with care the busy action of the dock, with ships in dry dock, and men unloading cargo. Even the sailmaker's firm of Morley, which is inscribed on the sign on the building to the extreme left, is known to have existed, directories listing it in Wapping until 1784.
Gallery label, August 2004
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artworks in The Exhibition Age
Robert Ladbrooke, Wood Scene exhibited 1806
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artworks in The Exhibition Age
Thomas Gainsborough, Giovanna Baccelli exhibited 1782
This portrait shows the famous Italian dancer Giovanna Zanerini, known on the stage as Baccelli, at the height of her career. Her elaborate costume seems to be adapted from the ballet Les Amants Surpris in which she had recently taken London by storm. Baccelli was the mistress of John Sackville, 3rd Duke of Dorset who commissioned the painting. The rapid brushwork, translucent paint and shimmering light effects are typical of Gainsborough’s style at this time. When the portrait was first exhibited, it was chiefly praised as an excellent likeness; ‘as the Original, light airy and elegant’.
Gallery label, February 2016
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artworks in The Exhibition Age
John Hill, Interior of the Carpenter’s Shop at Forty Hill, Enfield ?exhibited 1813
John Hill shows the interior of a small joinery shop that likely belonged to him and his father Thomas. Various tools and stages of production are visible: an axe and saw for cutting the wood in the foreground, and a planer for shaping it in the background. The unglazed window in the far corner of the workshop is large enough for big pieces of wood to pass through. It also provides ventilation and light for the ‘master’ carpenter. He is distinguished from his assistants by his moleskin hat and dark jacket. John likely included himself in the picture, possibly as this master carpenter (although this figure might also be his father). John later described himself as an ‘entirely self-taught' painter. He exhibited this painting at the Royal Academy in 1813. Such representations of craftsmen at work are rare in British art of this period.
Gallery label, October 2023
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artworks in The Exhibition Age
Charles Reuben Ryley, Oscar Bringing Back Annir’s Daughter 1785
The strength of Scottish identity lay not only in the figure of the Highlander, but also in a sense of Scotland’s ancient legendary past, enshrined in the potent myth of Ossian.
In the mid-eighteenth century, the poet James Macpherson had produced what he claimed was a faithful translation of an epic of primeval Scotland by an ancient Celtic bard named Ossian. In fact Macpherson had heavily edited fragments of Gaelic poems and added much of his own writing. His poems nevertheless provided sentimental and dramatic scenes for many late-eighteenth-century artists including English painters like Charles Ryley.
Gallery label, July 2004
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artworks in The Exhibition Age
Francesco Zuccarelli, A Landscape with the Story of Cadmus Killing the Dragon exhibited 1765
This painting illustrates the story of Cadmus, founder of the ancient city of Thebes, as told in Ovid’s Metamorphoses. Cadmus is slaying the dragon that has killed his companions. They have died trying to collect spring water from the dragon’s cave, not knowing that it is sacred to the god Mars. Cadmus is protected by a lion-skin and armed with a javelin. The Italian painter Zuccarelli left Venice for London in 1752, his mythological landscapes popular with British patrons. In 1768 he was commissioned to produce works for George III, and was a founding member of The Royal Academy.
Gallery label, February 2016
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artworks in The Exhibition Age
Benjamin West, Cleombrotus Ordered into Banishment by Leonidas II, King of Sparta 1768
Benjamin West showed this painting at the second exhibition of the newly formed Royal Academy. After several years in Italy, West had established himself in London as the leading painter of subjects from classical history. His example, and the Academy’s teaching, encouraged numerous young British artists to study in Italy.
His subject is an incident from ancient Greek history. Leonidas, king of Sparta, was usurped by his son-in-law, Cleombrutus. When Leonidas returns looking for revenge, his daughter pleads for her husband’s life. Leonidas is moved by her tears, and commutes Cleombrutus’s death sentence to banishment.
Gallery label, September 2004
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artworks in The Exhibition Age
Sir David Wilkie, The Blind Fiddler 1806
In this early work by Scottish-born David Wilkie an itinerant fiddler is playing for a humble country family. Wilkie focuses on the listeners’ different expressions. Only two people seem to respond to the music: the baby and the boy on the right, who is imitating the fiddler by playing the bellows. When this picture was exhibited at the Royal Academy some critics thought the bust on the shelf represented a dissenting minister, and concluded that the family were nonconformists. The power of music to stir the passions of those supposedly suspicious of pleasure was thought to add to the painting’s subtlety.
Gallery label, February 2016
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artworks in The Exhibition Age
Gilbert Stuart, Benjamin West, P.R.A. ?exhibited 1781
The American-born painter Benjamin West was one of the most successful artists of his generation. He was one of King George III’s favourite artists, which gave him privileges and wealth that made him the envy of his contemporaries. This polished portrait suggests an affluent and genteel personality.
West’s studio in London was a gathering place for Americans studying art in Europe. Many of these returned home to pursue careers in their newly independent homeland. This portrait is by one of West’s most successful American students, Gilbert Stuart.
Gallery label, August 2004
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artworks in The Exhibition Age
George Romney, A Lady in a Brown Dress: ‘The Parson’s Daughter’ c.1785
This portrait was originally exhibited as 'A Lady in a Brown Dress' but became known as 'The Parson's Daughter' in the later nineteenth century, when there was a fashion for giving such imaginative titles to portraits of anonymous sitters. The picture is considered to be an actual portrait rather than a 'fancy-piece', although the identity of the sitter is not known. A pencil sketch of the same subject is in the Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge.Romney was one of the most successful fashionable portrait painters of his time and a close rival of Reynolds and Gainsborough. His female portraits were particularly admired for their embodiment of the womanly virtues of chastity, simplicity and grace.
Gallery label, September 2004
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artworks in The Exhibition Age
John Hoppner, A Gale of Wind c.1794
Hoppner originally intended to become a landscape painter. However, this seascape, shown at Royal Academy in 1795, is the only work other than portraits he is known to have exhibited.
Attention is focused on the large figures in the foreground as they battle against the raging wind and the overwhelming forces of nature. The scene is set just off St Catherine’s Point on the Isle of Wight, known for its treacherous waters.
Gallery label, September 2004
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artworks in The Exhibition Age
Julius Caesar Ibbetson, Sand Quarry at Alum Bay ?exhibited 1792
Julius Caesar Ibbetson visited the Isle of Wight in 1791, which inspired him to paint many views of the coves and cliffs. This picture shows the local scenery at Alum Bay, with a group of men quarrying sand in the foreground. The famous Needles – a row of chalk stacks in the sea – are visible in the distance. This is probably one of the several coastal scenes of the Isle of Wight that Ibbetson exhibited at the Royal Academy between 1792 and 1796. Throughout his career, Ibbetson travelled widely, including to China and the island of Java in Indonesia (then a Dutch colony). Many of his landscape paintings were inspired by the places he visited.
Gallery label, October 2023
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artworks in The Exhibition Age
James Northcote, A Young Lady Playing the Harp ?exhibited 1814
A Young Lady Playing the Harp ?exhibited 1814 is an oil painting by the English artist and author James Northcote. It depicts a young harpist wearing a white dress tied with a long green sash, with a string of red beads around her neck. The harpist gazes forward, both hands raised to pluck the strings. She is seated against a rural backdrop dominated by a large, dark tree on the right, which frames her compositionally. The backdrop on the left, seen through the strings of the harp, features a twilit sky over hills and a lake.
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artworks in The Exhibition Age
John Hoppner, Miss Harriet Cholmondeley exhibited 1804
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artworks in The Exhibition Age
Philip James De Loutherbourg, A Distant Hail-Storm Coming On, and the March of Soldiers with their Baggage 1799
Loutherbourg’s picture is filled with foreboding. It was painted shortly after the French revolution and at the beginning of the wars with revolutionary France and its allies. The landscape is stormy and overcast, and peopled by soldiers. This reflects how the nation was becoming militarised and placed on a war footing, with military exercises and recruitment and conscription reaching even remote areas.
Gallery label, May 2007
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artworks in The Exhibition Age
George Stubbs, Mares and Foals in a River Landscape c.1763–8
This painting seems to have been used as an ‘overdoor’, hung with two other pictures by Stubbs above the doors in the dining room of George Brodrick, 3rd Viscount Midleton, MP (1730–65). Reflecting the ornamental use to which this painting was to be put, it seems that Stubbs, the premier animal painter of his day, did not set out to be especially original. The figures of the horses are the same as those appearing in another painting, a commission for Lord Rockingham representing specific horses owned by him, although the colour of one has been changed from brown to grey.
Gallery label, February 2016
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artworks in The Exhibition Age
George Stubbs, Horse Frightened by a Lion ?exhibited 1763
The dramatic theme of a lion attacking a horse preoccupied Stubbs for over thirty years. This painting comes from a series of four episodes in a terrifying attack on a passive horse. This is the first stage, as the horse scents the lion emerging from its cave and rises up in fright. The setting for this violent encounter is the harsh, rocky landscape of Creswell Crags in the Peak District. The area was then an inaccessible, wild region that fascinated Stubbs. The scenery makes a suitably romantic background for the ‘sublime’ drama of the scene.
Gallery label, February 2016
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artworks in The Exhibition Age
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