Portrait of Joseph Banks | |
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Artist | Joshua Reynolds |
Year | 1771–1773 |
Type | Oil on canvas, portrait |
Location | National Portrait Gallery, London |
Portrait of Joseph Banks is a portrait painting by the British artist Joshua Reynolds of the botanist and President of the Royal Society Joseph Banks. Banks had gained fame for his part in the explorer James Cook's First Voyage. Although it was intended he should also go on the Second Voyage this fell through due to the excessive demands of Reynolds. [1] Instead Reynolds went on a trip to Iceland. [2]
Reynolds was President of the Royal Academy and Britain's leading portraitist of the era. Banks sat for him several times between November 1771 and March 1773. To emphasise his role in discovery (as well as the globe beside him) Reynolds holds a paper containing a Latin quote from the poet Horace translated as "Tomorrow we will sail the high seas again". It is now in the collection of the National Portrait Gallery in London. [3]
Sir Joshua Reynolds was an English painter who specialised in portraits. John Russell said he was one of the major European painters of the 18th century. He promoted the "Grand Style" in painting, which depended on idealisation of the imperfect. He was a founder and first president of the Royal Academy of Arts and was knighted by George III in 1769.
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Sir Joseph Banks, 1st Baronet, was an English naturalist, botanist, and patron of the natural sciences.
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Portrait of Banastre Tarleton is a 1782 portrait painting by the English artist Sir Joshua Reynolds. It depicts the British army officer Banastre Tarleton against a background scene of battle, referring to his recent service in the American War of Independence. Tarleton is shown in the uniform of the British Legion, a unit of American Loyalist cavalry which he had served with before surrendering at the Siege of Yorktown in 1781. Reynolds, President of the Royal Academy, was of the country's leading portraitists.