Two unconventional self-portraits for a twofold problem
Currently taking a summer holiday in Ireland is Sir James Thornhill as his self-portrait will be hanging until September on a wall of the Hugh Lane Gallery as part of ‘Eva Gonzalès is what Dublin needs’. Together with some other new to me faces, this painting is displayed in the last exhibition room.
One of the joys of facing an unfamiliar painting is that there are no memories of reproductions intruding my responses to the work. And yet, as soon as I started considering Thornhill’s peculiar iconography, another (not British, but Italian) Baroque self-portrait sprang to my mind. It has made me delve deeper into the latter painting’s whereabouts and, so to speak, to cross-examine some facts. But let’s proceed in an orderly fashion and consider ‘exhibit A’.
Sir James Thornhill (1675 or 1676-1734), Sir James Thornhill, circa 1715-1720. © National Portrait Gallery, London.
Although Sir James Thornhill adorned some of the most magnificent late Stuart houses and public buildings - his mostly allegorical paintings recently celebrated in an exhibition at the Tate Britain - he may still be more famous for being William Hogarth’s father-in-law.
Taking centre stage in this unusual self-portrait is the allegorical personification of Painting. Gendered feminine in Latin, Greek and Italian, the figure of Pittura (Painting) is described in Cesare Ripa’s ‘Iconologia’ as a beautiful woman holding brushes and palette. First published in 1593, the Italian dictionary of iconography was translated into English in 1709 and it is worth noting that Thornhill painted this self-portrait short afterwards, circa 1715-1720.
Holding a palette and brushes in her left hand and a port crayon in her right, the allegory of Painting is adding the finishing touches to Thornhill’s portrait. From the easel on the right, the male artist gazes adoringly at the female figure who, in turn, seems to contemplate the drawing of an old man’s head on the scroll unfolded by a putto on the left. Whereas in the original the soft yellow and orange of Painting’s airy draperies quite match the ones in the image above, no digital reproduction can do justice to the azure blue, ivory, and gold of the head scarf. Go visit the exhibition and see for yourself.
A self-portrait of Angelica Kauffman is also displayed in the last exhibition room, together with other direct precedents to the portrait that Édouard Manet painted in 1870 of his pupil Eva Gonzalès as a Muse of Painting. When commissioned in the 1770s to paint the four ‘Elements of Art for the Royal Academy Council’s Room in Somerset House London, the Neoclassical painter broke with the tradition of representing Disegno (Design or Drawing) and Colore (Colour) as men.
Am I digressing from the main subject of this article? Possibly, but it ties in with “exhibit B” – ‘La Pittura regge l’autoritratto del pittore’ by Gian Domenico Cerrini. If looking at it you’re getting a feeling of déjà vu even though you have never visited the Pinacoteca di Bologna where the painting lives, it might be because the Italian Baroque painting has been recently reproduced in ‘Colour. A Visual History’ by Alexandra Loske. Actually (and this is positively a digression) Cerrini’s self-portrait has also been offered as an example of “male artists identifying with the ‘feminine’ character of Painting” in the catalogue of ‘Self-Portrait: Renaissance to Contemporary’, a 2005 exhibition at the National Portrait Gallery in London. Although I can partly agree with the Renaissance saying that “every painter paints himself”, I highly doubt we are facing distant ancestors of Greyson Perry’s feminine alter ego Claire here.
Gian Domenico Cerrini (1606-1681), La Pittura regge l’autoritratto del pittore, 1656/57. © 2022 Pinacoteca Nazionale di Bologna
But it is time I turn my attention to the Italian Baroque self-portrait, which also resorts to the personification of Painting to frame the artist as an object of admiration – or, someone may say, to divert viewers’ gaze from a face that didn’t launch a thousand ships.
In accordance with the classical iconographic tradition, Cerrini’s self-portrait features a charming woman holding a palette and brushes. Yet her work is done. She has, in fact, laid port crayon and maulstick down on the table and removed the portrait from the easel in order to show it to the viewers. Then again, Cerrini and La Pittura share the space more equally and are dressed in more vivid colours than in Thornhill’s self-portrait. Finally yet importantly for establishing the date of the painting, they are not accompanied by a serene winged putto but an ugly old woman who, biting her fist, personifies Envy.
So how these two paintings connect to one another despite all their notable differences? I’m afraid I still don’t have a complete and convincing answer but only a series of questions raised by one intriguing piece of information: ‘La Pittura regge l’autoritratto del pittore’ by Gian Domenico Cerrini was acquired in London in the 1970s.
Was the painting in an English collection? Which one? Since when? Is it possible Sir James Thornhill had seen it?
The curator of the Pinacoteca di Bologna’s collection promptly answered my email and kindly sent the 2008 catalogue entry for the painting. This, unfortunately, confused the matter of the provenance even more. Written by Rosa D’Amico, the document is interesting and useful especially for the proposed date of Cerrini’s self-portrait - as mentioned before, instrumental has been the association of the figure of Envy with a similar one on the cover of a pamphlet published immediately after Cerrini’s paintings for the dome of Santa Maria della Vittoria in Rome were revealed to the public in 1656. But when it comes to the provenance it states that the painting was acquired as a Carlo Cignani (1620-1719) from the “Galleria Municipale del Royal Borough of Kingston and Chelsea di Londra nel 1970”.
The above statement poses a twofold problem: the name of the London borough is a mash of two - ‘Kingston upon Thames’ and ‘Kensington and Chelsea’ - and the one of the gallery is a too vague reference. So far, a solicitous Archives & Local Studies Officer, who’s working at the Kensington Central Library, hasn’t been able to find anything connected to the painting in the records of their municipal buildings - no ‘Municipal Gallery’ as such.
To be continued.
