British Paintings

On View: West Building, Main Floor

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42 artworks on view.

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Shown from the knees up, an older man sits in a rustic wooden chair and holds up a pocket watch for a young child who stands at his knees in this vertical portrait painting. They both have pale, peachy skin with flushed cheeks. They are lit from our upper left so the man’s face is partly in shadow while light pours onto the child’s upturned face. The man’s body is angled to our right, almost in profile, but he turns his head to look at us with dark eyes under heavy brows. His has a bulbous nose, lined cheeks, and a heavy jowl around thin lips, which are closed in a line. His light gray, wavy hair is tied back at the nape of his neck. He wears a black coat with a high collar and tightly fitting sleeves. A streak of white at his neck suggests a white shirt under the black, high-necked vest that covers his torso. He rests his right elbow, closer to us, on the arm of the chair so he can dangle a pocket watch in front of the child. The man’s knees disappear behind the child, who leans against his legs. The pocket watch is attached to a short gold chain, and the child holds up the fob, which is shaped like a Hershey’s Kiss candy, at the end of the chain. The young boy looks up at the watch with luminous, brown eyes. He has smooth, round cheeks, a short nose, and his pink lips are closed. The child has wavy, golden brown hair and his white garment has a squared neckline, short sleeves, and falls like a skirt off the bottom edge of the painting. The background behind the pair is painted with streaks of marigold orange, gold, and olive green to suggest trees against a sky painted with butter and harvest yellow, rust orange, and just a touch of pale blue at the upper left corner. The entire portrait is loosely painted, especially in the background, chair, and clothing.

John Tait and His Grandson

Sir Henry Raeburn

c. 1793, with additions c. 1800

Oil on canvas  Accession ID  1937.1.103

On View: West Building Main Floor, Gallery M58
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Two large dogs approach a man lying unconscious and mostly buried in the snow in this horizontal painting. The head of the man comes toward us, at the lower center of the composition, and the dogs are close to us. In the center of the painting, a large tan and white dog has short, glossy fur and floppy ears, and its jowly mouth hangs open with the pink tongue visible. It paws at the snow partially covering most of the body of the man, who wears an olive-green coat with a fur collar and white shirt. The dog looks up to our right, and its body and white-tipped tail recede diagonally into the picture to the left. There is a red blanket with black edging over the dog’s back, and the hound wears a wide, fur-lined silver collar ornamented with metalwork lions and bells. The second dog, a dark brown brindle color, sits to the immediate left of the first dog. It gazes down at the prone person and bends its head down to lick a bare pale, pink hand that protrudes from under the snow. The brindle dog wears a small barrel around its neck on a brown buckled leather collar. The man’s dark brown hair falls over the snow. His pale gray face is upward, and his shoulders are visible while his arms splay out, and the rest of his body, extending into the picture, is covered with snow. The man’s eyes are closed. His right hand, in a tan leather glove, reaches toward us from the snow, while a green velvet cap with a red ribbon lies under the hand. The scene is enclosed by large, angular, steel and blue-gray boulders and rock formations, with two craggy pine trees above. Beyond lies a mountain landscape with a V-shaped pass at the center top framed by the steep ascent of jagged, snowy hillsides and a sliver of blue sky. A blocky stone building is nestled in among the crags to our right. On a path leading from the building, three bearded men wearing black caps and robes hurry toward the dogs. The nearest of them holds up a staff with a cross on the top and waves or signals to the men farther back along the path.

Alpine Mastiffs Reanimating a Distressed Traveler

Sir Edwin Landseer

1820

Oil on canvas  Accession ID  2019.120.1

On View: West Building Main Floor, Gallery M61
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A dog with short, curly, white hair stands in a wooden boat facing our right almost in profile, though it turns its head to look at us in this vertical portrait painting. The dog spans nearly the width of the canvas and is close to us. The dog’s ears hang down the side of its face to its chin. Its eyes are light brown and rimmed in black, and the lower lids are pink. The dog has a thick torso covered with tight curls, and it has a short puff of a tail. Its front legs are straight and the hind legs might be slightly bent. The dog stands on a slat spanning the width of the boat, which is angled away from us to our left. The landscape behind the has a calm, sage-green body of water with a tall, willow-like tree to our left and a lower band of leafy trees to our right. A few smoke-gray clouds float over the treetops in an otherwise pale blue sky.

White Poodle in a Punt

George Stubbs

c. 1780

Oil on canvas  Accession ID  1999.80.22

On View: West Building Main Floor, Gallery M61
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This painting is a portrait of a woman, her torso facing slightly to the left, her face looking directly at us. The woman has fair skin, rosy cheeks, and red lips in a subtle smile. Her hair is dark brown, voluminous, and curled, extending past her shoulders. The woman is dressed in a white gown with ruffled lace and white buttons. She wears a wide-brimmed hat with a blue-grey underside that matches a blue sash around her waist. Her hand rests on her midsection, holding a part of the sash. The background depicts abstract foliage in muted greens and yellows under a gray sky.

Miss Catherine Tatton

Thomas Gainsborough

1786

Oil on canvas  Accession ID  1937.1.99

On View: West Building Main Floor, Gallery M58
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Two windmills are backlit by silvery moonlight along the horizon of this loosely painted, horizontal landscape. The horizon comes about a third of the way up the composition. The left half of the painting is nearly filled with a towering tree with muted olive-green leaves and a tan trunk. Some dark branches dip toward the river that runs from the bottom center of the painting into the distance, in front of the windmills. Light shimmers on the gently rippling surface, which is lined to our right with grassy vegetation. A hollowed out, gnarled, broken tree trunk twists against the sky from the riverbank to our right. The windmills are in the near distance, facing off to our left. Their sails create Xs against the screen of pearly white clouds floating against a muted blue sky.

Moonlight on the Yare

John Crome

c. 1816/1817

Oil on canvas  Accession ID  1983.1.39

On View: West Building Main Floor, Gallery M58
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Shown from the waist up in front of a loosely painted landscape, a young woman with pale skin, flushed cheeks, and light brown hair curling softly around her face and neck turns her head to look at us from over her shoulder in this vertical portrait painting. Her body faces our left in profile, and she looks at us with dark brown eyes under arched brows. She has smooth, round cheeks, and her pink lips are closed. She wears a wide brimmed ivory-white, straw hat that casts a shadow across her forehead. At the front of the crown, a tawny-brown bow is set against a ribbon striped with dove gray and white. A sheer, white cape edged with feathers or fur drapes over the shoulders of her rose-pink, satin dress. Ruffles along her chest appear to be tied with fawn-brown bows. A white, textured area near the bottom edge of the canvas suggests that her hands are clasped in front of her waist in a muff. Behind her, a harvest-gold hillside rises to a band of pine-green trees along the right edge of the composition. Filling most of the background, the opalescent sky has pewter-gray clouds angling across a pale blue sky.

Mrs. Davies Davenport

George Romney

1782-1784

Oil on canvas  Accession ID  1937.1.105

On View: West Building Main Floor, Gallery M58
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The painting depicts a man shown from the knees up, standing with his arms crossed over his chest and his head turned to the right. He has light skin, ruddy cheeks with a brown mole, a long nose, and small red lips in a neutral expression. His gray hair is styled into curls above his ears that peek out from under a black hat. His clothing is rich in detail, consisting of a dark blue-and-red coat with gold embroidery and gold buttons, and an off-white scarf or cravat wrapped around his neck. His right hand wears a black glove and holds a cane, as well as the other glove. The background features large, moss-covered rock formations, with a few green vines trailing across them. The pale-yellow sky behind it is filled with clouds, with some hints of blue at the top.

Portrait of a Gentleman

Joseph Wright

c. 1770-1773

Oil on canvas  Accession ID  1940.1.11

On View: West Building Main Floor, Gallery M59
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This painting is a portrait of a man standing upright, his chest facing us and his head turned to the left. A horse is positioned directly behind him, and his left arm is lifted, resting on the horse's back. The man has fair skin and wavy gray hair that curls around his ears and seems to be tied behind his neck. He has a slightly flushed complexion, a long nose, pale eyebrows, and lips that seem to be partially open. He wears a formal military uniform, including a brown coat adorned with silver braiding, a brown vest, a pink sash tied at his waist, tan trousers, and tall black boots. He holds a black hat in his right hand. The horse is brown, with its rear visible on the right and its head on the left. The background shows a wooded landscape with dark brown trees and a cloudy red sky.

Captain Patrick Miller

Sir Henry Raeburn

1788/1789, altered later (date unknown)

Oil on canvas  Accession ID  1948.19.1

On View: West Building Main Floor, Gallery M59
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This painting depicts a coastal scene with a large group of people with light skin dressed in draping fabric in shades of red, yellow, blue, and purple. In the bottom left corner, two men, one old and one young, stand in front of a dark, stormy sea, upon which a large ship is tilting dramatically to one side near large, rocky cliffs. The sky above the ship is full of dark clouds, with streaks of bright yellow surrounded by magenta breaking through the gray. The men face the right, and the young man has his hand outstretched towards a group of women in a grassy meadow dotted with small flowers. One woman at the front of the group faces the men, her arm outstretched towards them. Three women sit at her feet, and a group of five women cluster behind her, hugging one another tightly. On the right, four more women dance in a group, their arms upraised and knees bent. Behind the meadow are tall, olive-green trees.

Telemachus and Calypso

Benjamin West

c. 1809

Oil on canvas  Accession ID  2015.19.98

On View: West Building Main Floor, Gallery M61
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Shown from the knees up, a woman sits looking off into the distance in front of a deep, shadowy landscape in this vertical portrait painting. The woman’s body is angled slightly to our right, but she turns her oval face to the left to gaze off with brown eyes. Her upper lip is thin, and her lower lip is fuller. A cloud of ash-brown curls frames her face, and long locks fall over her shoulders. Her wide-brimmed black hat is set at a steep angle to our left. The hat has a white feather lying along the front edge and a pearl hanging from the top front of the brim. Her butter-yellow gown has translucent white ruffles along the low, scooped neckline and a strand of pearls tied at in a bow at the front of the chest. The puffy sleeves come just past the elbows and are similarly lined with ruffles and encircled with pearls. The overskirt drapes over a topaz-blue underskirt. The woman holds a feather in the hand resting in her lap. Her left elbow, to our right, is propped on a stone and that hand holds a gold-colored scarf up by her face. Deeply shaded trees and a murky blue sky fill the background. The portrait is loosely painted in the clothing and background.

Frances Susanna, Lady de Dunstanville

Thomas Gainsborough

c. 1786

Oil on canvas  Accession ID  2014.79.706

On View: West Building Main Floor, Gallery M59
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This painting is a portrait of a man standing, seen from the knees up, his torso and head slightly turned to the left. The man has pale skin and gray hair styled back from his face and forming curls around his ears, and he has a sharp nose, thick gray eyebrows, and pink lips set in a neutral expression. He wears a dark blue coat with gold buttons, a pale-yellow waistcoat, and a frilly white cravat at his neck, with more white frills at his cuffs. His trousers are tan. His left arm is bent, resting on a tall rock formation on the right. His left hand is gloved and holds the other yellow glove. His bare right hand holds a thin brown cane. The background features loose leaf shapes in warm autumnal colors, with the gray-brown trunk of a tree visible in the top left and glimpses of a purple and gray sky on the left side. The area behind his head is brown.

Francis Basset, Lord de Dunstanville

Thomas Gainsborough

c. 1786

Oil on canvas  Accession ID  2014.79.705

On View: West Building Main Floor, Gallery M59
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The bodies of four people are locked together through dramatic gestures and poses against a dark background in this nearly square painting. The two men have pale, peachy skin and the two women have ash-white skin, and together they almost fill the composition. A man with a white beard and hair wears a short-sleeved brown garment and sits to the right of center. His body faces our left and both of his arms reach straight out at shoulder height. His head juts forward and his bulging eyes appear white. He points at a younger man kneeling in front of him with his left hand. Near the left edge of the canvas, the younger man’s body also faces our left as he kneels on his left knee. His body leans forward over his right knee, which is bent so that foot is flat on the ground. His head is thrown back and his right hand, on our left, crosses his body and is raised as if to shield his face. His other arm extends so the raised flat of his hand is close to the old man’s face. The young man has dark hair and wears a tight-fitting, short-sleeved, golden yellow tunic. One woman with long blond hair rests her hands and leans her forehead onto the old man’s knee in the lower right corner. The second woman stands behind the pair of men with her arms spread wide so one hand reaches over the shoulder of the old man, and her other hand nearly touches the younger man’s head. She has long, curly brown hair, and she looks at the older man with her lips parted. Both women wear white and pale gray garments. There is the suggestion of blue sky beyond some trees along the left edge of the composition but the rest of the background is deep in shadow.

Oedipus Cursing His Son Polynices

Henry Fuseli

1786

Oil on canvas  Accession ID  1983.1.41

On View: West Building Main Floor, Gallery M61
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