OLD MASTER PAINTING 18th CENTURY Circle of FRANCIS WHEATLEY RA Gold Gilt Frame

Description
PAINTING REF 11209
 
“Good condition for age, FRANCIS WHEATLEY R.A painted on the frame ...cleaned and relined ready to hang , frame alone is worth £500”
 
Fine OIL PAINTING Old Master 18th Century FRANCIS WHEATLEY R.A in a Large French Gold Gilt Frame
By F. Wheatley Ra Similar $10,000 Premier Collection Fine Original French frame
 
Description
 
Mid 18th Century 
 
 
Title: May i have this dance
 
Artist: Circle Of Francis Wheatley RA (1747 - 1801)
 
Signed: Printed on the frame
See my guide note 5 on unsigned works
 
Provenance: John castagno signature 
directory
 
Medium : Oil painting on canvas 
 
Condition: very good
 
Country: english school
 
Frame sizes : 24.5 in x 21.5 in x 3.5 in thick
( 62 cm x 55 cm x 9 cm )
 
Canvas sizes : 17 in x 13 in
 
https://artuk.org/discover/artists/wheatley-francis-17471801
 
Francis Wheatley exhibited his series of oil paintings entitled the “Cries of London” at the Royal Academy between 1792 and 1795. Two year earlier, the forty-one year old painter had been elected to the Academy in preference to the King’s nominee and, as a consequence, he never secured any further commissions for portraits from the aristocracy. Losing his income entirely, what should have been the crowning glory of his career was its unravelling – Wheatley was declared insolvent in 1793 and struggled to make a living until his death in 1801, when the Royal Academy paid his funeral expenses.
Yet in the midst of this turmoil, Wheatley created these sublime images of street sellers that – although seen at the time as of little consequence beside his aristocratic portraits – are now the works upon which his reputation rests. Born in Covent Garden in 1747, Wheatley was ideally qualified to portray these hawkers because he grew up amongst them and their cries, echoing in the streets around the market. You will recognise the old stone pillars of the market buildings that still stand today in a couple of these pictures, all of which could be located specifically in that vicinity. However, these pictures are far from social reportage as we understand it, and you may notice a certain similarity between many of the women portrayed in these pictures, for whom it is believed Mrs Wheatley – herself a painter and exhibitor at the Royal Academy – was the model. Look again, and you will also see that variants on the same ginger and white terrier occur throughout these paintings too.