Gainsborough: Portraits by a Doting Father

Thomas Gainsborough painted more portraits of his family than any other British artist before him, at least as far as we know. Some of the 50 or so pictures in Gainsborough's Family Album, now on show at the National Portrait Gallery in London, are small in scale and dashed off with an economical use of paint, because a busy artist didn't want to use up too much time, energy or materials on a job to please the in-laws. Others are more polished, to show off his skills to a demanding clientele. 

Gainsborough, one of the great names of the 18th-century golden age of British painting, really preferred landscapes, but as far as portraits are concerned he seems to have saved his best, his most endearing work for his favourite sitters, his daughters Mary and Margaret. 

Here they are, pictured in 1756, when Mary would have been about six and Margaret a year younger. The elder girl restrains her sister to stop her pricking her finger as she reaches towards a butterfly perched on a thistle. It's a painting with messages: the danger inherent in a child's pursuit of thoughtless impulses, and of course the fleetingness of a moment, childhood and life itself. But it's an artistic breakthrough by Gainsborough as well: the first depiction of near-lifesize figures in motion in a landscape setting. It is, above all, lovely, light and soft and filled with emotional intimacy, as is another image of the daughters from a couple of years later.

If this painting doesn't appear quite right, that's because at some point it was cut up and stitched back together, with Mary, the daughter on the left, moved to place her face on the same level as Margaret on the right, whose hair she's adjusting. That's why the arm appears strangely shaped. But it's the faces that capture the attention, lovingly rendered, so full of expression.

Life turned out not to be kind to Gainsborough's daughters. He had them trained up to be artists -- and painted them at their drawing. But they didn't pursue their father's calling. When the family moved to London later on in Gainsborough's career, he portrayed them as very much the fashionable sort of young ladies that formed part of his clientele, complete with loyal dog. But Mary's marriage to a German musician broke down quickly, and amid deteriorating mental health, she was cared for until her death by her younger sister, who never married.

In this show, we first meet Gainsborough as an aspiring young artist at the age of about 20, together with his young wife, Margaret Burr. He was a prodigy: He'd set up his own studio in London's Hatton Garden at 16, and here he is asserting his claim that he and his spouse are fashionable Suffolk gentlefolk, the social equals of their patrons. The child is the couple's short-lived first daughter, also named Mary.

There's something familiar about this painting, you think. And of course there is. In her blue, Mrs Gainsborough seems to be the model for the wife in that most famous of her husband's pictures, Mr and Mrs Andrews, painted just a couple of years later. And as with Mrs Andrews, Gainsborough never appears to have got around to finishing off the woman's hands.

Gainsborough spent several years working in Ipswich in the 1750s, and there are numerous portraits of other members of his wider family on display here. None approach the intensity of that butterfly picture of Mary and Margaret, though one that comes close depicts his niece, Susan Gardiner, looking defiant and serious, and bearing a little bit of a likeness to his daughters.

From Ipswich, Gainsborough moved to Bath, the most fashionable resort in England, and here he painted himself looking elegant. This picture, and a companion portrait of his wife, is likely to have been displayed in his showroom, demonstrating to potential customers just how they could look if given the Gainsborough treatment.

That was the polished method. But Gainsborough liked to work fast. He is reputed to have knocked off this image of his apprentice, his nephew Gainsborough Dupont, in a sitting lasting less than an hour, unusually adding a TG monogram to demonstrate his authorship. The blue cavalier suit and brushwork are an homage to Van Dyck, the portraitist from the previous century Gainsborough liked to compare himself with.

There are some memorable vignettes in this family album. Gainsborough's rather disreputable brother known as Scheming Jack is on display, looking rather shifty and dishevelled. Jack would come up with brilliant money-making ideas that tended to fail miserably, with the consequence that his siblings regularly had to bail him out. And then there's Gainsborough's sister, Sarah Dupont, depicted in all her finery, in an apparent complete mismatch with her carpenter husband, Philip Dupont, looking dull and drab in last decade's suit.

And let's not forget Gainsborough's wife Margaret. It appears to have been a tempestuous marriage, but he painted her each year on their wedding anniversary. She was around 50 when this portrait was painted, the consort of one of Britain's most sought-after artists, now living in London in a handsome residence. The eye is caught by the rapidly painted black lace mantle, but there seems to be something of a weariness in Margaret's eyes as she stares at us full on.

This exhibition offers a wonderful chance to see another side to Gainsborough's work. But it's the tenderness and sensitivity in the early portraits of his daughters that steal the show.

Practicalities

Gainsborough's Family Album is on at the National Portrait Gallery in London until February 3. It's open daily from 1000 to 1800, with lates on Fridays until 2100. Full-price tickets are £14, or £16 including a donation, and can be bought online here. The NPG is on St Martin's Place, just off Trafalgar Square and right next to the National Gallery. National rail and London Underground services at Charing Cross and Leicester Square stations are just a couple of minutes' walk away.

More Gainsborough on show

There are two more exhibitions focusing on the artist currently running outside London: Gainsborough and the Theatre at the Holburne Museum in Bath, on until January 20, includes 15 oil portraits and explores themes such as celebrity and friendship; Early Gainsborough, at Gainsborough's House in Sudbury, Suffolk, looks at the start of the artist's career and closes on February 17.

Images

Thomas Gainsborough, Mary and Margaret Gainsborough, the Artist’s Daughters Chasing a Butterfly, c. 1756, National Gallery, London. © The National Gallery, London
Thomas Gainsborough, Mary and Margaret Gainsborough, the Artist’s Daughters, c. 1760-61, Victoria and Albert Museum, London. Image © Victoria and Albert Museum, London
Thomas Gainsborough, The Artist with his Wife Margaret and Eldest Daughter Mary, c.1748 (?), National Gallery, London. © The National Gallery, London
Thomas Gainsborough, Self-Portrait, c. 1758-59, National Portrait Gallery, London. © National Portrait Gallery, London
Thomas Gainsborough, Gainsborough Dupont, the Artist’s Nephew, 1773, Waddesdon (Rothschild Family)
Thomas Gainsborough, Margaret Gainsborough, the Artist’s Wife, c. 1777, Samuel Courtauld Trust, Courtauld Gallery, London