Appendix III — A Note on Some Portraits of Wren
The following brief particulars of several portraits of Wren, some of which are reproduced in the preceding pages, may lead to more precise information being disinterred:
(a) Wren as a Man of Forty (Plate II.).—When I saw this, it was in the possession of the late Mrs. Catherine Pigott. It is now, I believe, in the possession of the Bishop of Southwell, to whom it passed on Mrs. Pigott’s death. It is unsigned, and there is no record as to its authorship. It shows Wren as a young man, and I had thought it represented him while in the twenties. Mr. Richard W. Goulding, F.S.A., dates the cravat about 1675, which would make Wren forty-three. The modelling of the face is not unlike that of the Pearce bust, which tends to confirm the age as about forty.
(b) The Wadham College Portrait (Plate XIII.).—This is in itself a poor piece of painting, and has a vague history. It is an 1825 copy by John Smith, of Oxford, deriving ultimately, it is said, from a Kneller portrait at Lambeth Palace, which, I am informed, has disappeared. It seems rather to be based on the Sheldonian portrait, which was attributed by Dallaway to Thornhill, “painted in conjunction with Verrio and Kneller.” I give the unlikely story of its authorship as it is told, adding only that as the plan in Wren’s hand shows the St. Paul’s of the Warrant Design or later, it must be after 1675, and therefore Wren is depicted as a man of forty-three or more, probably a good deal more, for he is markedly older than in the last mentioned.
(c) Bust by Edward Pearce at the Ashmolean (Plate V.).—This beautiful work has been dated 1673, by a letter written by Christopher, the architect’s son, and quoted by Mr. Lionel Cust. It may well be Wren as a man of forty-one, and the younger Christopher’s date can be accepted, but he was very casual in his chronologies.
(d) The Royal Society Portrait.—The legend on the frame says this picture is by Michael Wright, but Mr. Collins Baker attributes it, on the ground of style, to Riley and Closterman in collaboration. He claims that it is the basis of the Kirkall engraving (see next note). If so, Kirkall turned the face the other way. The view of St. Paul’s shows a transitional design between the Warrant Design with its nightmare steeple and the dome as built. The clock towers are almost exactly like the intermediate design preserved at All Souls. I suggest it shows a man of seventy.
(e) The Kirkall Engraving after Closterman (Plate XV.).—This rare portrait was given to me by Mrs. Pigott shortly before her death, and apart from its having been, as she told me, an heirloom in the Wren family, it has an interest as showing Elisha Kirkall’s “chiaroscuro” style of engraving interpreting Closterman’s portrait.
(f) The St. Paul’s Deanery Portrait (Plate XIV.).—This is a copy of the best known portrait of all, the Kneller at the National Portrait Gallery, and an inferior copy, for it reveals a man of far less distinction, both in character and feature, than the National portrait. The latter is attributed to the year 1711, and is therefore of Wren when he was nearly eighty.
(g) The Welbeck Portrait (Plate IV.).—The picture is a small whole length on panel. The architect wears a red dressing-gown with white lining, white stockings, and red shoes; his right hand is placed on his hip, and in his left hand he holds a drawing of the elevation of the façade of St. Paul’s. On the left side of the picture there is a lurid sky indicative of the burning of the City; in the right-hand top corner is a bust of Charles II., flanked by an amorino weighing the insignia of royalty (crown, sceptre, etc.), against four shields of arms (England, France, Scotland, and Ireland), and round the waist of the amorino is a scroll lettered “Justum est.”
This picture was acquired by the fifth Duke of Portland in 1861. It was then attributed to H. Gascar, who is stated to have been in England circa 1674-80, and who might consequently have painted Sir Christopher soon after he made his design for the new Cathedral. The West Front is shown in the picture with the single Order, an early stage of the design. The architect looks very young for a man of about forty-two years of age, but in the case of painted portraits it is often difficult to reconcile the actual age of a sitter with his apparent age.
(h) The Queen’s College Bust.—This posthumous portrait has been attributed to Rysbrack; it is certainly worthy of him. Wren is shown as a very old man.
(k) The Medal at Wadham College (Plate XVI.).—As it is commonly said that this medal was struck to celebrate the completion of St. Paul’s, it is a little unkind to have to set down the fact that it was cast and chased (not struck) by G. D. Gaale, a German, about the year 1783, when he exhibited it in London, sixty years after Wren’s death in 1723.
(l) Art Union of London Medal.—A medal was issued in 1846: obverse, with bust of Wren, signed H. Wilson, Sc.; reverse, St. Paul’s, signed B. Wyon.
I hope the above notes may lead people better informed than myself to bring out facts which will enable a full and correct catalogue of Wren portraits to be prepared. Their publication in the Bicentenary issue of Architecture brought Mr. Richard W. Goulding to my aid in correcting some mistakes I then made, and he has added the facts about the Welbeck portrait.
A list of engravings after the Kneller portrait is given in Mr. F. O’Donoghue’s “Catalogue of Engraved English Portraits in the British Museum.”
Footnotes
A English Leadwork: Its Art and History, chapter vi.
B “The Complete Building Accounts of the City Churches (Parochial) designed by Sir Christopher Wren,” Archæologia, vol. lxvi.
C A History of Renaissance Architecture in England.
D I dealt with this subject in detail some years ago in the Architectural Review.
E In Form in Civilization (Oxford University Press), 1922, a volume to be read by everyone, for it contains the ripe judgment on many matters of a very stimulating critic of the part played by architecture in thought and life.
F In Wren’s petty cash accounts is the entry: “For a booke on Vitruvius for the use of ye office—£3.”
The “Country Life” Library
ENGLISH HOMES
By H. AVRAY TIPPING, M.A., F.S.A.
A Monumental Work on the Country Homes of
England, divided into the following distinctive
Chronological and Dynastic Periods:
| I. | NORMAN AND PLANTAGENET | 1066-1485 (Now Ready) |
| II. | EARLY TUDOR | 1485-1558 (Ready Autumn, 1923) |
| III. | LATE TUDOR AND EARLY STUART | 1558-1649 (Now Ready) |
| IV. | LATE STUART | 1649-1714 (Now Ready) |
| V. | EARLY GEORGIAN | 1714-1760 (Now Ready) |
| VI. | LATE GEORGIAN | 1760-1820 (In Preparation) |
It is the aim of this great work to be for English Domestic Architecture and Life what the “Dictionary of National Biography” and the “New English Dictionary” are for our other heritages of History and Language. That it may worthily take the place which is its undoubted due beside these works in every Reference Library, private or public, no effort has been spared in dealing with the splendid subject.
In the six volumes here announced is systematically and sympathetically set forth in all its fascinating fullness that building up of homes and home life which has been so closely influenced by, and has in its turn so strongly impressed, the minds and ideas of the generations who have made our England.
EACH VOLUME CONTAINS
FROM 400 TO 500 SUPERB ILLUSTRATIONS AND PLANS
Price Three Guineas net each
Published at the offices of “COUNTRY LIFE”
THE ARCHITECTURE OF
ROBERT AND JAMES ADAM
(1758-1794)
By ARTHUR T. BOLTON, F.S.A., F.R.I.B.A.
This important work forms a complete survey of the Architecture, Decoration, and Furniture of the famous Adelphi Brethren, and constitutes a monumental record of the Adam style. Although during the Greek and Gothic Revivals Adam architecture was freely destroyed, there still remains, as these volumes prove, a marvelous wealth of work, much of which is complete with the actual Furniture, Carpets, and Hangings made to his designs. No country in the world can show equivalent instances of such historical preservation as are illustrated in these magnificent volumes.
TWENTY-FIVE
GREAT HOUSES OF FRANCE
By SIR THEODORE ANDREA COOK, M.A., F.S.A.
WITH AN INTRODUCTORY CHAPTER OUTLINING THE
DEVELOPMENT OF FRENCH DOMESTIC ARCHITECTURE
BY W. H. WARD, M.A., F.R.I.B.A.
Illustrations by Frederick H. Evans.
In this volume Sir Theodore Cook presents a pageant of the great figures who surrounded the throne of such kings as François Premier and Louis Quatorze. Louis of Orleans at Pierrefonds, the Duke of Guise at Blois, Fouquet at Vaux le Vicomte and Condé at Chantilly—these are typical of the story that the author unfolds, with a grasp so sure that the men and women live again, while their great houses are depicted with a wealth of illustration never before achieved or attempted.
GARDEN ORNAMENT
By GERTRUDE JEKYLL.
Examples are furnished, from the finest gardens in the country, of beautiful Balustrading; graceful Gates, Urns, Vases and Sculptured Ornaments; Stone paved Courts, Paved Ways and Garden Seats, Loggias, Orangeries, Garden Houses and Dovecotes, Parterres, Sundials, Topiary Work, Pergolas and Treillage, Canals, Ponds and Water Gardens, Bridges, Fountains and Dipping Wells, Flower Borders, Wall Gardening and Japanese Gardens.
THE
GARDENS OF ITALY
With Historical and Descriptive Notes by E. March Phillipps.
Edited and thoroughly revised, with copious additions and reproductions of valuable old plans.
By ARTHUR T. BOLTON, F.S.A., F.R.I.B.A.
The Gardens illustrated are grouped by districts, beginning in the South with Rome, followed by the neighbourhood of the Eternal City—as Tivoli and Frascati, Bagnaia and Caprarola. Proceeding northwards the reader comes to Florence, famous for the Villas and Gardens in the neighbourhood of the City. Then follows Venetia, with the celebrated Malcontenta, Stra and Maser. The Lake District succeeds, with Balbianello and the Borromenian Islands; and finally the inexhaustible regions of Italian art at Genoa, renowned for superb examples of palatial architecture and gardening art.
Emboldened page numbers in the Index indicate illustrations.
← Back to Sir Christopher Wren: Scientist, Scholar and Architect