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Portrait of Colonel Charles Heathcote

Joseph Wright of Derbyc. 1771–72

The Cleveland Museum of Art

The Cleveland Museum of Art
Cleveland, United States

Assuming a relaxed but commanding pose, Colonel Charles Heathcote (1734–1797) stands beside a large oak tree in the foreground of an expansive landscape. He wears military dress, the single epaulette on his right shoulder designating his rank as colonel. Wright’s composition demonstrates his new-found fascination with landscape: while the figure is relatively smoothly painted, the landscape is painted far more energetically, using thickly applied daubs of color.

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  • Title: Portrait of Colonel Charles Heathcote
  • Creator: Joseph Wright of Derby (British, 1734–1797)
  • Date Created: c. 1771–72
  • Physical Dimensions: 127 x 100 cm (50 x 39 3/8 in.)
  • Provenance: Colonel Charles Heathcote (1730–1803) and by descent, (Christie's, London, April 26, 1985, no. 113), Private Collection, USA, (Sotheby's, London, November 12, 1997, no. 69), (Sotheby's, London, June 8, 1999, no. 13), (Christie's, New York, January 26, 2011, no. 35), Private Collection, (Thos. Agnew and Sons Ltd., London, from whom purchased by the Cleveland Museum of Art), The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH
  • Type: Painting
  • Rights: CC0
  • External Link: https://clevelandart.org/art/2017.100
  • Medium: Oil on canvas
  • Fun Fact: The handful of small-scale, full-length portraits Wright painted early in his career include his earliest experiments in landscape painting.
  • Department: European Painting and Sculpture
  • Culture: England
  • Credit Line: John L. Severance Fund
  • Collection: P - British before 1800
  • Accession Number: 2017.100
The Cleveland Museum of Art

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