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Title:Thomas Howard (1585–1646), Second Earl of Arundel, after Rubens
Artist:Henry Bone (British, Truro 1755–1834 Somerstown)
Date:1808
Medium:Enamel
Dimensions:7 1/4 x 5 3/4 in. (185 x 147 mm)
Classification:Miniatures
Credit Line:The Moses Lazarus Collection, Gift of Josephine and Sarah Lazarus, in memory of their father, 1888–95
Accession Number:95.14.82
The Artist: Bone was born in Truro, Cornwall, the son of a cabinetmaker. He was apprenticed as a china painter, but after the failure of the Bristol factory where he was working, he settled in London about 1779. The greater part of his output consisted of copies in enamel of old master and contemporary paintings, but he painted a few portraits ad vivum. He exhibited at the Royal Academy from 1781 until 1834 and was named a royal academician in 1811. He served as enamel painter to George III, George IV, and William IV, and he often incorporated references to these and similar appointments in the lengthy inscriptions he wrote in the enamel on the back of his miniatures. He died in London.
The Miniature: An inscription on paper attached to the back of the frame, similar to that on the back of the enamel (see Signatures, Inscriptions, and Markings), probably in the artist's hand, adds the information that the Rubens portrait was in the possession of Lord Frederick Campbell and that Henry Bone was enamel painter in ordinary to George III. Rubens's oil sketch of 1629 is now in the National Portrait Gallery, London.
Thomas Howard, earl of Arundel, was a courtier and collector, especially of antique sculpture (the Arundel marbles are now in the Ashmolean Museum, Oxford) and works by Holbein.
The National Portrait Gallery, London, has Bone's squared pencil drawing (Walker 1999, no. 11). The inscription differs from those above in stating: Earl of Arundel after Rubens for Lord F. Campbell—Septr 1807 [ink line drawn through date] 1808 & for Lord Suffolk—1808 The original—Lord F. Campbell. Walker (1999) lists a second version of the enamel in a private collection, England.
[2016; adapted from Reynolds and Baetjer 1996]
Inscription: Inscribed (reverse, in black on blue enamel): The Earl of Arundel / London Jany 1808. / Painted by Henry Bone ARA. / Enamel Painter to his R.H. the / Prince of Wales, for Lord / Frederick Campbell, after / the Original by Rubens.
Moses Lazarus, New York (until d. 1885); his daughters, Josephine and Sarah Lazarus, New York (1885–1888/95)
London. Royal Academy. May 2–June 18, 1808, no. 363.
New York. The Metropolitan Museum of Art. "European Miniatures in The Metropolitan Museum of Art," November 5, 1996–January 5, 1997, no. 222.
J. Jope Rogers. Notice of Henry Bone, R.A., and His Works, Together with Those of His Son, Henry Pierce Bone, and Other Members of the Family. Truro, n.d., p. 11.
Graham Reynolds with the assistance of Katharine Baetjer. European Miniatures in The Metropolitan Museum of Art. Exh. cat., The Metropolitan Museum of Art. New York, 1996, pp. 14, 173–74, no. 222, ill.
Richard Walker. "Henry Bone's Pencil Drawings in the National Portrait Gallery." Walpole Society 61 (1999), p. 312, under no. 11, lists a second enamel by Bone in a private collection, England.
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