Baron Bexley

Produced at the pinnacle of Thomas Lawrence's career, during his time as President of the Royal Academy in London, this large-scale portrait depicts Nicholas Vansittart, 1st Baron Bexley, who was then the head of His Majesty's Treasury. Lawrence shows Bexley as a handsome man of imposing presence, character, and, most of all, extraordinary wealth--robed, in a red velvet chair, before stone columns. Lawrence was receiving many royal commissions at the time, resulting in portraits that, like this one, testified to his immense painterly skill and his ability to flatter his upper-class subjects.