Gilbert Stuart
Portrait of Robert Livingston (b. 1733)

ArtistAmerican, 1755–1828
CultureAmerican
Titles
  • Portrait of Robert Livingston (b. 1733)
Datec. 1789
PlaceDublin, Ireland
MediumOil on canvas
DimensionsCanvas: 30 × 25 in. (76.2 × 63.5 cm)
Credit LineThe Bayou Bend Collection, gift of Mr. and Mrs. Harris Masterson III
Object numberB.72.117
Current Location
The Audrey Jones Beck Building
106 Cameron Gallery
Exposé

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Department
Bayou Bend
Object Type
Description

Rhode Island-born Gilbert Stuart rose to great prominence as a portraitist of post- Revolutionary America and image maker of its first president, George Washington. As a youth, Stuart learned the principles of painting from the Scottish artist Cosmo Alexander (1724–1772) and followed him to Edinburgh in 1771 to work in his studio. After Alexander died a year later, Stuart returned home briefly before embarking on a twelve-year sojourn in London, studying with Benjamin West (see B.67.25 and B.67.26) for many years before setting up his own studio in 1781. He quickly became one of the premier portraitists of London. At the height of his power and fame in London, Stuart found his personal finances in disarray and traveled to Dublin both to avoid London creditors and to respond to his Irish patron, Charles Manners, duke of Rutland. In 1787, a notice appeared in the London newspapers: “Mr. Stewart [sic] the portrait-painter, is not gone to France, but to Ireland; when it is probable that he will embark for America:—where it is hoped his merit will find an asylum, preferable to what he experienced in England.” In Dublin, Stuart began painting prominent political figures, Irish personalities, and the gentry. The portrait of Robert Livingston (b. 1733),  one of the many Irish sitters Stuart painted in his five-year stay in Dublin, is typical of the artist’s style: the sitter’s intense, engaging expression, loose, fluid brushwork, rich color, and bravura handling of the whites of the sitter’s costume, here displayed in the starched ruffles of his shirt.

Related examples: Similar Dublin portraits by Stuart in the oval format include Luke White, c. 1787, NGA; John Richardson, c. 1788, in Park 1926, pp. 645–46, no. 707; and Reverend William Preston, c. 1788, in Park 1926, p. 624, no. 679.

Book excerpt: David B. Warren, Michael K. Brown, Elizabeth Ann Coleman, and Emily Ballew Neff. American Decorative Arts and Paintings in the Bayou Bend Collection. Houston: Princeton Univ. Press, 1998.


Provenance[Sabin Galleries Ltd., London]; purchased by Carroll Sterling (1913–1994) and Harris Masterson III (1914–1997), Houston, 1970; given to MFAH, 1972.
Exhibition HistoryAnne Cruikshank and the Knights of Glin, "Irish Portraits 1660–1860", National Gallery of Ireland, Dublin, August 14–October 14, 1969; National Portrait Gallery, London, October 30, 1969–January 4, 1970; Ulster Museum, Belfast, January 28–March 9, 1970, no.89.

Inscriptions, Signatures and Marks
In addition to the frame label, a handwritten paper label glued to the stretcher reads: Robertus Livingstone / Anno et. 56 / 1789
[no marks]

Cataloguing data may change with further research.

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