Frederic (North) Earl of Guildford.

Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres (1780-1867) was a French Neoclassical painter. Although he considered himself to be a painter of history in the tradition of Nicolas Poussin and Jacques-Louis David, in whose studio he studied, it is Ingres's portraits, both painted and drawn, that are recognised as his greatest legacy.

Ingres was profoundly influenced by past artistic traditions, and aspired to become the guardian of academic orthodoxy against the ascendant Romantic style, exemplified by  Eugène Delacroix. His expressive distortions of form and space made him an important precursor of modern art, influencing Picasso, Matisse and other modernists.

Following the fall of Napoleon in 1815, Ingres found an enthusiastic clientele among the English tourists in Rome, who had flocked back to the city liberated from French rule. One tourist after another beat a path to his door wanting their portrait drawn. The first Englishman to sit to Ingres was Frederick North (1766-1827), 5th Earl of Guilford (and youngest son of Lord North, prime minister to George III), an engaging eccentric portrayed with a penetrating eye for his quickness of mind. Ingres made several drawings of North, whose spare but lively descriptive pencil line impressed his sitter. One of these is in the Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney. This lithograph is an early one in the history of the medium, a near contemporary of Théodore Géricault's <em>The English blacksmith </em>(Te Papa 1969-0010-22), and was was printed by C. Hullmandel (apparently a UK printer) between 1818-27.

A passionate philhellene (lover of Greek civilisation) and linguist, North travelled widely and lived much of his life abroad. After a stint as governor- general of Ceylon (1798-1805), he led the campaign to establish the Ionian University at Corfu, becoming its first chancellor in 1824. When North retired to London a few years later, he amused his friends by going about in academic robes, or turning up to dinner wearing the vestments of an archbishop of the Orthodox church, to which he was a convert.

See:

Art Gallery of New South Wales, https://www.artgallery.nsw.gov.au/collection/works/120.1992/

Wikipedia, 'Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres', https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean-Auguste-Dominique_Ingres

Dr Mark Stocker    Curator, Historical International Art   April 2018