Richard Wilson was an influential Welsh landscape painter, who worked in Britain and Italy. With George Lambert he is recognised as a pioneer in British art of landscape for its own sake and was described in the Welsh Academy Encyclopedia of Wales as the "most distinguished painter Wales has ever produced and the first to appreciate the aesthetic possibilities of his country". In December 1768 Wilson became one of the founder-members of the Royal Academy. A catalogue raisonné of the artist's work compiled by Paul Spencer-Longhurst is published by the Paul Mellon Centre for Studies in British Art.
George Stubbs was an English painter, best known for his paintings of horses. Self-trained, Stubbs learnt his skills independently from other great artists of the 18th century such as Reynolds and Gainsborough. Stubbs' output includes history paintings, but his greatest skill was in painting animals, perhaps influenced by his love and study of anatomy. His series of paintings on the theme of a lion attacking a horse are early and significant examples of the Romantic movement that emerged in the late 18th century. He enjoyed royal patronage. His painting Whistlejacket hangs in the National Gallery, London.
The Grand Tour was the principally 17th- to early 19th-century custom of a traditional trip through Europe, with Italy as a key destination, undertaken by upper-class young European men of sufficient means and rank when they had come of age. The custom—which flourished from about 1660 until the advent of large-scale rail transport in the 1840s and was associated with a standard itinerary—served as an educational rite of passage. Though it was primarily associated with the British nobility and wealthy landed gentry, similar trips were made by wealthy young men of other Protestant Northern European nations, and, from the second half of the 18th century, by some South and North Americans.
Thomas Girtin was an English watercolourist and etcher. A friend and rival of J. M. W. Turner, Girtin played a key role in establishing watercolour as a reputable art form.
A catalogue raisonné is a comprehensive, annotated listing of all the known artworks by an artist either in a particular medium or all media. The works are described in such a way that they may be reliably identified by third parties, and such listings play an important role in authentication.
Paul Mellon was an American philanthropist and an owner/breeder of thoroughbred racehorses. He is one of only five people ever designated an "Exemplar of Racing" by the National Museum of Racing and Hall of Fame. He was co-heir to one of America's greatest business fortunes, derived from the Mellon Bank created by his grandfather Thomas Mellon, his father Andrew W. Mellon, and his father's brother Richard B. Mellon. In 1957, when Fortune prepared its first list of the wealthiest Americans, it estimated that Paul Mellon, his sister Ailsa Mellon-Bruce, and his cousins Sarah Mellon and Richard King Mellon, were all among the richest eight people in the United States, with fortunes of between US$400 and 700 million each.
Sir Ellis Kirkham Waterhouse was an English art historian and museum director who specialised in Roman baroque and English painting. He was Director of the National Galleries of Scotland (1949–52) and held the Barber chair at Birmingham University until his official retirement in 1970.
John Trevor Hayes was a British art historian and museum director. He was an authority on the paintings of Thomas Gainsborough.
Francis Towne was a British watercolour painter of landscapes that range from the English Lake District to Naples and Rome. After a long period of obscurity, his work has been increasingly recognised from the early 20th century onwards.
Martin Postle is a British art historian who is deputy director for collections and publications at the Paul Mellon Centre for Studies in British Art, London, and a leading expert on the art of Sir Joshua Reynolds. He is a former curator at the Tate Gallery.
Martin Harrison is a British art historian, author and curator, noted for his work on photography, on the medium of stained glass and its history, and as an authority on the work of the painter Francis Bacon.
Mark Louis Hallett is an English art historian specialising in the history of British art. He is the Märit Rausing Director of the Courtauld Institute of Art.
Penelope Curtis is a British art historian and curator. Fom 2015 to 2020 she was the director of Lisbon's Museu Calouste Gulbenkian, and from 2010 to 2015 director of Tate Britain. She is the author of several monographs on sculpture and has written widely at the invitation of contemporary artists.
Michael J. Rosenthal is emeritus professor of the history of art at the University of Warwick. He is a specialist both in British art and culture of the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, and the arts of early colonial Australia.
Daphne Haldin was a British art historian and honourable secretary of the Society of Jews and Christians.
Hugh Graham Belsey, MBE, is a British art historian who is an authority on the art of Thomas Gainsborough. For 23 years he was the curator of Gainsborough's House in Sudbury. His most recent contribution to Gainsborough scholarship is his catalogue raisonné of Gainsborough's portraits published in February 2019 by the Yale University Press for the Paul Mellon Centre for Studies in British Art.
Judith Emilie Egerton was an Australian-born British art historian and curator. She specialised in eighteenth-century British art and, particularly, the work of George Stubbs.
Adolph Paul Oppé, was a British art historian, critic, art collector and museum official. Born in London, the son of a silk merchant, he was educated at Charterhouse, the University of St Andrews, and New College, Oxford. From 1902–1905 he taught Greek and ancient history at the universities of St Andrews and Edinburgh, and from 1905–1938 worked as a civil servant in the Board of Education. He also served as Deputy Director of the Victoria & Albert Museum. Oppé was elected as a Fellow of the British Academy in 1952.
Roger Taylor, MVO born 1940, is a curator, photographic historian, and educator specialising in nineteenth century British photography and its social and cultural history. He is Professor Emeritus of Photographic History at De Montfort University.
Piano Nobile is a commercial art gallery in London, England, specialising in twentieth-century British art. It was established by Dr Robert Travers at premises in Richmond in 1985. In 2000, the gallery moved to its current address at 129 Portland Road, London. In 2019, an additional gallery space was acquired at 96 Portland Road. Between 2008 and 2019, the gallery also had an exhibition space at Kings Place in King’s Cross.
