John Smart, Portrait of a Man, 1771

Chicago:

Aimee Marcereau DeGalan, “John Smart, Portrait of a Man, 1771,” catalogue entry in Aimee Marcereau DeGalan, Blythe Sobol, and Maggie Keenan, The Starr Collection of Portrait Miniatures, 1500–1850: The Collections of the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, vol. 4, ed. Aimee Marcereau DeGalan (Kansas City, MO: Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, 2025), https://doi.org/10.37764/8322.5.1528.

MLA:

Marcereau DeGalan, Aimee. “John Smart, Portrait of a Man, 1771,” catalogue entry. Aimee Marcereau DeGalan, Blythe Sobol, and Maggie Keenan. The Starr Collection of Portrait Miniatures, 1500–1850: The Collections of the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, edited by Aimee Marcereau DeGalan, vol. 4, Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, 2025. doi: 10.37764/8322.5.1528.

See the artist’s biography in volume 4.

This 1771 portrait, like several others John Smart realized around this time—see also Portrait of Ralph Payne, 1768, and Portrait of a Man, 1773—features a man wearing a fashionable sky-blue coat. The sitter appears in a silk version with a standing collar and flowered metal buttons trimmed with narrow bands of metallic galloon. Galloon, or Galon as it was sometimes spelled in British English, is “a narrow trimming (as of lace or braid with metallic threads) having both edges scalloped.”¹ He sports a matching blue waistcoat, white high-necked collared shirt, and lace jabot. Smart retains the olive-brown background, as in miniatures he made in the 1760s, but instead of his sitter confronting the viewer with his gaze, he looks outward and to the right, his sun-kissed complexion suggesting time spent in a warmer climate beyond England.

The year 1771 was significant for John Smart, as he ascended to the role of director of the Society of Artists. That year, he also completed several important commissions, including a portrait of Twinings tea heir Richard Twining (Fig. 1), who assumed the mantle of the business from his widowed mother.² Like the Nelson-Atkins sitter, Twining is also richly dressed in a blue coat with gilt embellishments on his waistcoat. These luxurious clothes align with those of many of Smart’s other sitters from this period, suggesting the possibility that the present sitter may also belong to the wealthy merchant class, like Twining.³ Given the warm undertones of the sitter’s complexion, he—like Ralph Payne—may have amassed his wealth through colonial ventures in the Caribbean or India.

This portrait was previously set in a bracelet clasp, which may indicate that it was commissioned as part of a betrothal; however, the setting was later modified to form a locket by closing the openings on the sides. Regardless, this miniature was likely worn on the body, close to its intended recipient, emphasizing the intimacy in which it was originally conceived as a token of love, loss, or familial affection.

Notes

1. Merriam-Webster, s.v. “Galloon,” accessed July 8, 2024, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/galloon.

2. Emma Rutherford and Lawrence Hendra, John Smart (1741–1811): A Genius Magnified (London: Philip Mould and Company, 2014), 28.

3. Rutherford and Hendra, John Smart (1741–1811), 28.

Unknown owner, by July 28, 1952 [1];

Purchased from the unknown owner’s sale, Objects of Art and Vertu, Miniatures, Coins and Watches, Decorative Objects, Christie’s, London, July 28, 1952, lot 34, as Portrait of a Gentleman, by Leggatt Brothers, London, probably on behalf of Mr. John W. (1905–2000) and Mrs. Martha Jane (1906–2011) Starr, Kansas City, MO, 1952–1965 [2];

Their gift to the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City, MO, 1965.

Notes

[1] According to the sales catalogue, “Different Properties” sold lots 1–34.

[2] The lot description states, “Portrait of a Gentleman, by John Smart—signed with initials and dated 1771—three-quarter face looking over left shoulder, wearing pale blue coat and vest and with powdered wig with black bow—oval, 1 1/2 in. high.” An annotated sale catalogue is located at the University of Missouri-Kansas City, Miller Nichols Library and is likely annotated by Mr. or Mrs. Starr with a circled lot number and “240.” According to Art Prices Current 29 (1951–1952), Leggatt bought lot 34 for 86 pounds. Archival research has shown that Leggatt Brothers served as purchasing agents for the Starrs. See correspondence between Betty Hogg and Martha Jane Starr, May 15 and June 3, 1950, Nelson-Atkins curatorial files.

The Starr Foundation Collection of Miniatures, The Royal Ontario Museum, Toronto, December 8, 1972–January 14, 1973, no cat., no. 97, as Unknown Man.

John Smart: Virtuoso in Miniature, The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City, MO, December 21, 2024–January 4, 2026, no cat., as Portrait of a Man.

Catalogue of Objects of Art and Vertu, Miniatures, Coins and Watches, Decorative Objects (London: Christie’s, July 28, 1952), 7.

Ross E. Taggart, The Starr Collection of Miniatures in the William Rockhill Nelson Gallery (Kansas City, MO: Nelson Gallery-Atkins Museum, 1971), no. 97, p. 38, (repro.), as Unknown Man.