Mary Beale

Based on the costume and the style of the sitter’s wig, this portrait of an unknown man can be dated to the late 1670s. It is a good example of Beale’s formal portraiture, most likely painted ‘for profit’ – as opposed to ‘for study and improvement’ – and shows her distinctive sensitivity in the highlighting of facial features.

Between 1671 and 1682 Beale charged £5 for a portrait on this scale, with an additional £1 chargeable for the use of ultramarine.[1] Portraits such as this followed a relatively standard template, with the sitter shown in classical dress and placed against a plain background. They were sometimes embellished with decorative oval cartouches of a carved stonework design, as seen in the present work and also in the Portrait of a Young Girl in this exhibition. These trompe-l’oeil borders were sometimes painted by Beale’s children, Bartholomew and Charles, who earned £32-12-05d and £18-07-06d respectively for carrying out this work in the years 1676-77.[2]

The frame around this portrait is original, and of the same design as that seen around other known works by Beale, including two portraits of Sir William and Elizabeth Trumbull. They were possibly provided by the framemaker Tobias Flessiers (d.1689), who we know was supplying frames to Charles in 1677, around the time this work and the Trumbull portraits were painted.[3]

[1] Draper 2020, p.208.

[2] Ibid., p.203.

[3] ‘Mr Flessiers’ was paid £4.6s in January 1677 for four frames and a further £1.16 in March 1677; see Charles Beale, ‘Notebook 1676/7’, Oxford, Bodleian Library, MS Rawlinson, 8o 572. Quoted in Simon, ‘Tobias Flessiers’.