LOT DETAILS

Materials:

oil on canvas

Size Notes:

56 by 76 in.; 138.4 by 190.5 cm.

Edition:

Wright's sensational portrait of Mr. and Mrs. William Chase marks a turning point in the artist's approach to portraiture, and indeed a turning point in the development of the British conversation piece. Though little is known of Wright's sitter's, Mr. and Mrs. William Chase, the commission was clearly an important one for the artist. It is the largest picture painted by Wright to this point in his career when executed in circa 1762-1763. It anticipates a number of Wrights most famous portrait masterpieces of the following decades, specifically in its highly refined and technically brilliant background design and ornamentation. Wright has here taken the effort to elaborate and expand the background design of the painting, a specific decision no doubt influenced by the likely importance of the commission at this early mature career moment. Rather than include a more standard and simple drapery framing device, Wright has here included a grand country house with Doric pillar, a richly folded curtain, red lacquer desk, and Rococo scrollwork on the wall.1 Judy Edgerton argued that the room portrayed here, possibly fictive, may have inspired Wright in his design of his later masterpiece An Experiment on a Bird in the Air Pump, painted approximately four or five years following the present portrait. Specifically, variants of the sash window, draped curtains, and parrot in its domed wire cage all feature in some capacity in Wrights later groundbreaking genre scene.

Description:

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Markings:

inscribed lower left: Mr & Mrs Willm Chase/md 1760