Thomas Stothard

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Thomas Stothard RA (born August 17, 1755 in London ; † April 27, 1834 there ) was an English painter and engraver .

Thomas Stothard after a painting by George Henry Harlow

life and work

Thomas Stothard was born in London to a wealthy innkeeper in Long Acre . He was a sensitive child and was sent to live with a relative in Yorkshire when he was five years old . There he went to school first in Acomb, later in Tadcaster and in Ilford ( Essex ). He showed a talent for drawing early on and was apprenticed to a draftsman for brocade silk patterns in the London borough of Spitalfields . In his spare time he tried to make illustrations for the works of his favorite poets. Some of these drawings have received praise from Harrison, editor of Novelist's Magazine . When his teacher died, Stothard decided to devote himself to art.

In 1778 he became a student at the Royal Academy of Arts . In 1792 he was elected an associate member and in 1794 a full member. In 1812 he was appointed librarian after working as an assistant for two years. Among his earliest book illustrations are panels for Ossian and Robert Bell's 24-volume edition of English poets. From 1780 he regularly drew for Novelist's Magazine , a total of 148 illustrations, including eleven for Peregrine Pickle as well as several graceful motifs after Clarissa and Sir Charles Grandison .

The copperplate engraver friend Thomas Fielding started working from 1786 on the basis of templates from Stothard, Angelika Kauffmann and his own designs. Arcadian scenes were particularly popular, the implementation of which was achieved in excellent quality with copper color engravings in dotted style by fielding. Stothard's designs met the highest aesthetic standards.

He designed boards for paperbacks, tickets for concerts, illustrations for almanacs and portraits of famous actors. Because of his delicate and special style, his engravings are highly valued by collectors today. Among his more important works are two collections of illustrations for Robinson Crusoe , one for New Magazine and one for Stockdale's Edition , as well as the engravings for The Pilgrim's Progress (1788), for Harding's Edition of Goldsmith's Vicar of Wakefield (1792) The Rape of the Lock (1798), on the works of Solomon Gessner (1802), on William Cowper's Poems (1825) and on Das Dekameron . His figure drawings in the first-class editions of Samuel Rogers Italy (1830) and Poems (1834) also prove that he still had a rich imagination and craftsmanship even in old age.

The art historian Ralph Nicholson Wornum estimates that there are 5,000 designs by Stothard, of which approximately 3,000 were copperplate engravings. His oil paintings were usually small. Their coloring is often strong and glowing, based on the practice of Rubens, whom Stothard greatly admired. Vintage , perhaps his most famous oil painting, hangs in the National Gallery of London. His best-known painting, however, is the procession of the Canterbury pilgrims , which also hangs in the National Gallery and whose engraving, started by Luigi, continued by Niccolo Schiavonetti and finished by James Heath, was extremely popular. The commission for this picture had been given to Stothard by Robert Hartley Cromek, which caused an argument with his friend William Blake. This resulted in a joint work, Flitch of Bacon ("bacon"), which was drawn in sepia for the engraver, but was never executed in color.

In addition to his easel work, Stothard decorated the grand staircase of Burghley House, near Stamford in Lincolnshire, on the themes of war, intemperance and Orpheus' descent into the underworld (1799-1803); the manor house of Hafod in North Wales with a sequence of scenes by Jean Froissart and Enguerrand de Monstrelet (1810), the dome of the upper hall of the Advocates' Library in Edinburgh with Apollo and the Muses as well as faces of poets, speakers etc. (1822). He also worked on designs for a frieze and other decorations for Buckingham Palace, but these were not carried out due to the death of George IV. He also designed a magnificent coat of arms that was given to the Duke of Wellington by the merchants of London. He made a series of eight copperplate engravings with the various themes that adorned the coat of arms. The British Museum has a collection of engravings from Stothard's work in four volumes.

His son was the painter and antiquarian Charles Alfred Stothard .

literature

Web links

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personal data
SURNAME Stothard, Thomas
BRIEF DESCRIPTION English painter and engraver
DATE OF BIRTH 17th August 1755
PLACE OF BIRTH London
DATE OF DEATH April 27, 1834
Place of death London