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Creator:
William Hogarth, 1697–1764
Title:

William Cavendish, Marquess of Hartington, Later fourth Duke of Devonshire

Former Title(s):

William Cavendish, Marquess of Hartington, Later 4th Duke of Devonshire [1998, This Other Eden: Paintings from the Yale Center for British Art, exhibition catalogue]

Date:
1741
Medium:
Oil on canvas
Dimensions:
29 7/8 x 25 inches (75.9 x 63.5 cm)
Inscription(s)/Marks/Lettering:

Signed and dated, lower right: "W Hogarth Pinx | 1741"

Credit Line:
Yale Center for British Art, Paul Mellon Collection
Copyright Status:
Public Domain
Accession Number:
B1981.25.358
Classification:
Paintings
Collection:
Paintings and Sculpture
Subject Terms:
brown | collar | hat | man | marquess | oval | portrait
Associated People:
Cavendish, William, fourth duke of Devonshire (bap. 1720, d. 1764), prime minister
Access:
Not on view
Note: To make an appointment to see this work, please contact the Paintings and Sculpture department at ycba.paintings@yale.edu. Please visit the Paintings and Sculpture collections page on our website for more details.
Link:
https://collections.britishart.yale.edu/catalog/tms:5034
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William Hogarth’s portraits were admired by the professional class but had little appeal to aristocrats, perhaps because of their unflattering directness and bold handling of paint. This is consequently a very rare portrait of a noble sitter, the eldest son of the Duke of Devonshire and future head of one of Britain’s most powerful families. Among Hogarth’s finest portraits, it demonstrates his extraordinary, and largely self-taught, skill as a painter. It even retains what is probably its original frame, an exceptional example of the French Régence style.

Gallery label for installation of YCBA collection, 2016
William Cavendish was born in 1720, the eldest son of the 3rd Duke of Devonshire. In 1729 he became Marquess of Hartington and in 1741, the year of his coming of age, he was elected to the House of Commons as mp for Derbyshire. It was in that same year that Hogarth painted this portrait, inscribed "W. Hogarth Pinxt 1741" and "The Right Hon.ble The Marquess of Hartington." Hogarth regarded portraiture as a lesser branch of the art of painting, and the arrival in England in 1737 of the French portraitist Jean-Baptiste van Loo prompted him to combine, with particular venom, his criticism of portraiture with his contempt for foreign artists and styles. Re?ecting upon van Loo's overwhelming success with English patrons, he wrote in his autobiographical notes: Portrait Painting…[is] a branch [of painting] that depends cheifly on much practice and an exact Eye as is plain by men of very midling natural parts haveing been at the utmost hights of it [-it] hath allways been engrossed by a very few Monopelisers whilst many others in a superior way more desirving both as men and artists are every were [sic] neglected… Vanloe a freinch portrait painter…with his…Puffing mono [po]lised all the people of fasheon in the kingdom…so that allour [artists] down went at once…into utmost distress and poverty.1 When he undertook portraits himself, it was partly in a spirit of de?ance and competition, challenging his foreign rivals like van Loo and those who did not consider him capable of "face painting." From 1738 until the mid-1740s he painted portraits on a fairly regular basis, although he never established a proper practice. In contrast to most portrait painters, who often employed a battery of other artists to paint drapery and backgrounds, Hogarth always painted all parts himself. The Marquess of Hartington is a prime example of Hogarth's abilities as a portraitist. The thick impasto on the Marquess's face and in the gold, silver, and red braid on his vest and jacket shows particular con?dence and ?air. Such vivacious passages of paint and color, in which one can almost sense the hand of the artist jabbing at the canvas, lend a liveliness to his portraits that definitively sets them apart from the work of van Loo, in which a smooth-or "licked"-surface gives the sitter an elegant, polished veneer. As a nobleman the Marquess stands out among Hogarth's sitters, most of whom were from the gentry or upper-middle class. Even he appears primarily as a wealthy gentleman; he clearly possesses grace and bearing, and his clothes are ?ne and expensive, but no symbols overtly proclaim his rank. The Marquess, who became Duke of Devonshire in 1755, played a large role in Hogarth's later artistic career. In 1757, after he had become Lord Chamberlain, he appointed Hogarth to the post of Sarjeant Painter to George II (a position for which the artist had been passed over twenty-four years before when Sir James Thornhill stepped down to be succeeded by his son John). The post was extremely lucrative and therefore perfect for the aging, embittered, and increasingly ailing painter.

Julia Marciari-Alexander, This other Eden, paintings from the Yale Center for British Art, Yale Center for British Art, New Haven, CT, 1998, p. 44, no. 10, ND1314.3 Y36 1998 (YCBA)
Commissioned by William Cavendish, fourth Duke of Devonshire (1720-1764), the sitter, from William Hogarth (1697-1764), the artist, in 1741; by descent to his son, George Augustus Henry Cavendish, first Earl of Burlington (1754-1834); by descent to his son, Charles Compton Cavendish, first Baron Chesham (1793-1863) of Latimers, Buckinghamshire; by descent to his son, William Cavendish, second Baron Chesham (1815-1882); by descent to his son, Charles Cavendish, third Baron Chesham (1850-1907); by descent to his son, John Compton Cavendish, fourth Baron Chesham (1894-1952); by descent to his son, John Cavendish, fifth Baron Chesham (1916-1989); purchased by Paul Mellon (1907-1999) at Agnew’s, 1972; by whom given to the Yale Center for British Art, 1981.

Chatsworth Drawings (The Frick Art Museum, 1987-08 - 1987-11) [YCBA Objects in the Exhibition] [Exhibition Description]

This Other Eden : British Paintings from the Paul Mellon Collection at Yale (Art Gallery of South Australia, 1998-09-16 - 1998-11-15) [YCBA Objects in the Exhibition] [Exhibition Description]

This Other Eden : British Paintings from the Paul Mellon Collection at Yale (Queensland Art Gallery, 1998-07-15 - 1998-09-06) [YCBA Objects in the Exhibition] [Exhibition Description]

This Other Eden : British Paintings from the Paul Mellon Collection at Yale (Art Gallery of New South Wales, 1998-05-01 - 1998-07-05) [YCBA Objects in the Exhibition]

Ronald Brymer Beckett, Hogarth, Routledge & Kegan Paul, London, 1949, p. 50, no. 129, NJ18 H67 B43 1949 [ORBIS]

Malcolm Cormack, Concise Catalogue of Paintings in the Yale Center for British Art, Yale Center for British Art, New Haven, CT, 1985, pp. 120-121, N590.2 A83 (YCBA) [YCBA]

Elizabeth Einberg, The age of Hogarth, British painters born 1675-1709 , vol. 2, Tate Gallery, London, 1988, p. 91, ND466 T38 1988 + OVERSIZE (YCBA) [YCBA]

Elizabeth Einberg, William Hogarth : A Complete Catalogue of the Paintings, New Haven, London, 2016, p. 233, cat. 152, NJ18 H67 +E36 2016 Oversize (YCBA) [YCBA]

Paul Mitchell, Frameworks : form, function & ornament in European portrait frames, , Paul Mitchell Limited, London, 1996, p. 174, fig. 132, N8551 E85 M56 1996 (YCBA) [YCBA]

Anne Hollander, Fabric of vision, dress and drapery in painting , The National Gallery, London, London, 2002, p. 121, no. 92, ND1460 D73 H65 2002 (YCBA) [YCBA]

Julia Marciari-Alexander, This other Eden : Paintings from the Yale Center for British Art, , Yale Center for British Art, New Haven, CT, 1998, p. 44, no. 10, ND1314.3 Y36 1998 (YCBA) [YCBA]

Paul Mellon's Legacy : a passion for British art [large print labels], , Yale Center for British Art, New Haven, CT, 2007, v. 3, N5220 M552 P381 2007 OVERSIZE (YCBA) [YCBA]

Ronald Paulson, Hogarth : His Life, Art, and Times, , Yale University Press, New Haven, 1971, p. 456, pl. 172, NJ18 H67+ P39 Oversize (YCBA) [YCBA]

Robin Simon, Hogarth, France and British Art : The Rise of the Arts in 18th-Century Britain, , Hogarth Arts, London, 2007, pp. 161, 213-4, fig. L, NJ18 H67 +S55 2007 Oversize (YCBA) [YCBA]

Roy C. Strong, The British portrait, 1660-1960, Antique Collectors' Club, Woodbridge, Suffolk, 1991, pp. 162-63, 177, col. pl. 31, ND1314 B743 1991 (YCBA) [YCBA]

Jennifer S. Uglow, Hogarth, a life and a world , Faber and Faber, London, 1997, p. 346, NJ18 H67 U35 1997 (YCBA) [YCBA]


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