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Thomas Gainsborough
Thomas Gainsborough RA FRSA (14 May 1727 (baptised) – 2 August 1788) was an English portrait and landscape painter, draughtsman, and printmaker. Along with his rival Sir Joshua Reynolds, he is considered one of the most important British artists of the second half of the 18th century.
The feathery brushwork of his mature work and rich sense of colour contribute to the enduring popularity of his portraits. Unlike Reynolds, he avoids references to Italian Renaissance art or the Antique, and shows his sitters in fashionable contemporary dress. Despite being a prolific portrait painter, Gainsborough gained greater satisfaction from his landscapes.
He was born in Sudbury, Suffolk, the son of a wool manufacturer. The artist spent his childhood at what is now Gainsborough’s House, on Gainsborough Street, Sudbury. He trained in London, and set up in practice in Ipswich about 1752. In 1759 he moved to Bath, a fashionable spa town, attracting many clients for his portraits. He later resided there, following the death of his father in 1748 and before his move to Ipswich.
When he was still a boy he impressed his father with his drawing and painting skills, and he almost certainly had painted heads and small landscapes by the time he was ten years old, including a miniature self-portrait. Gainsborough was allowed to leave home in 1740 to study art in London, where he trained under engraver Hubert Gravelot but became associated with William Hogarth and his school. He assisted Francis Hayman in the decoration of the supper boxes at Vauxhall Gardens, and contributed one image to the decoration of what is now the Thomas Coram Foundation for Children.
In 1746, Gainsborough married Margaret Burr, an illegitimate daughter of the Duke of Beaufort, who had settled a £200 annuity on her. In 1752, he and his family, now including two daughters, Mary (“Molly”, 1750–1826) and Margaret (“Peggy”, 1751–1820), moved to Ipswich. Commissions for portraits increased, but his clients included mainly local merchants and squires. He had to borrow against his wife’s annuity.
The art historian Michael Rosenthal described Gainsborough as “one of the most technically proficient and, at the same time, most experimental artists of his time”. He was noted for the speed with which he applied paint, and he worked more from observations of nature (and of human nature) than from application of formal academic rules. The poetic sensibility of his paintings caused Constable to say, “On looking at them, we find tears in our eyes and know not what brings them.”
Gainsborough’s enthusiasm for landscapes is shown in the way he merged figures of the portraits with the scenes behind them. His landscapes were often painted at night by candlelight, using a tabletop arrangement of stones, pieces of mirrors, broccoli, and the like as a model. His later work was characterised by a light palette and easy, economical strokes.
His more famous works, The Blue Boy; Mr. and Mrs. Andrews; The Painters Daughters Chasing a Butterfly; William Hallett and His Wife Elizabeth, known as The Morning Walk; and , display the unique individuality of his subjects. Joshua Reynolds considered Girl with Pigs “the best picture he (Gainsborough) ever painted or perhaps ever will”.
Thomas Gainsborough’s works became popular with collectors from the 1850s on.
He died of cancer on 2 August 1788 at the age of 61. According to his daughter Peggy, his last words were “Van Dyck”. He is interred in the churchyard St. Anne’s Church, Kew, Surrey.
Read moreShowing 1–100 of 383 results
Mr. and Mrs. Andrews
By Thomas GainsboroughSizes starting at $439.00The Blue Boy 1770
By Thomas GainsboroughSizes starting at $339.00Ann Ford (later Mrs. Philip Thicknesse) 1760
By Thomas GainsboroughSizes starting at $349.00Mr and Mrs William Hallett (‘The Morning Walk’)
By Thomas GainsboroughSizes starting at $349.00Portrait of the Artist’s Daughters
By Thomas GainsboroughSizes starting at $339.00The Gravenor Family 1754
By Thomas GainsboroughSizes starting at $329.00The Painters Daughters Chasing a Butterfly 1756
By Thomas GainsboroughSizes starting at $309.00The Painter’s Daughters with a Cat
By Thomas GainsboroughSizes starting at $329.00The Painter’s Two Daughters 1758
By Thomas GainsboroughSizes starting at $409.00Portrait of John Plampin 1752
By Thomas GainsboroughSizes starting at $359.00The Hon. Mrs. Thomas Graham
By Thomas GainsboroughSizes starting at $319.00The Honourable Mrs Graham
By Thomas GainsboroughSizes starting at $359.00Portrait of Mrs. William Villebois
By Thomas GainsboroughSizes starting at $349.00Georgiana, Duchess of Devonshire 1783
By Thomas GainsboroughSizes starting at $369.00Mrs. Richard Brinsley Sheridan
By Thomas GainsboroughSizes starting at $339.00The Cottage Girl 1785
By Thomas GainsboroughSizes starting at $339.00Girl with Pigs
By Thomas GainsboroughSizes starting at $299.00Elizabeth and Mary Linley 1772
By Thomas GainsboroughSizes starting at $349.00Mary Countess Howe 1764
By Thomas GainsboroughSizes starting at $359.00Miss Catherine Tatton 1786
By Thomas GainsboroughSizes starting at $299.00Portrait of a Lady in Blue
By Thomas GainsboroughSizes starting at $309.00The Hon. Frances Duncombe 1777
By Thomas GainsboroughSizes starting at $349.00Mrs Siddons 1785
By Thomas GainsboroughSizes starting at $309.00The Painter’s Daughter Mary
By Thomas GainsboroughSizes starting at $309.00Portrait of Sir Richard Brooke
By Thomas GainsboroughSizes starting at $309.00Portrait of Thomas Brooke
By Thomas GainsboroughSizes starting at $309.00Conversation in a Park 1746
By Thomas GainsboroughSizes starting at $319.00Mr and Mrs Carter
By Thomas GainsboroughSizes starting at $339.00Portrait of the Artist with his Wife and Daughter 1748
By Thomas GainsboroughSizes starting at $349.00The Byam Family
By Thomas GainsboroughSizes starting at $339.00The Baillie Family 1784
By Thomas GainsboroughSizes starting at $349.00Portrait of Philip Dehany with his Wife Margaret and their Daughter Mary
By Thomas GainsboroughSizes starting at $439.00Portrait of The Three Eldest Princesses- Charlotte, Princess Royal, Augusta and Elizabeth 1784
By Thomas GainsboroughSizes starting at $409.00Heneage Lloyd and his sister 1750
By Thomas GainsboroughSizes starting at $369.00Lady Lloyd and Her Son, Richard Savage Lloyd, of Hintlesham Hall, Suffolk
By Thomas GainsboroughSizes starting at $339.00Portrait of a Woman 1750
By Thomas GainsboroughSizes starting at $289.00Portrait of a Woman, Possibly of the Lloyd Family 1750
By Thomas GainsboroughSizes starting at $319.00Hester, Countess of Sussex, and Her Daughter, Lady Barbara Yelverton 1771
By Thomas GainsboroughSizes starting at $389.00Mrs Mary Cobbold and Miss Cobbold, with a Lamb and a Ewe
By Thomas GainsboroughSizes starting at $339.00A Couple in a Landscape 1753
By Thomas GainsboroughSizes starting at $319.00The Marsham Children 1787
By Thomas GainsboroughSizes starting at $399.00Woman with a Spaniel 1749
By Thomas GainsboroughSizes starting at $299.00The Charleton Children
By Thomas GainsboroughSizes starting at $329.00Double portrait of Master John Truman Villebois
By Thomas GainsboroughSizes starting at $329.00Elizabeth and Thomas Linley 1768
By Thomas GainsboroughSizes starting at $319.00Margaret Gainsborough gleaning
By Thomas GainsboroughSizes starting at $309.00The Mall in St. James’s Park
By Thomas GainsboroughSizes starting at $309.00Pomeranian Bitch and Puppy 1777
By Thomas GainsboroughSizes starting at $329.00Cornard Wood, near Sudbury, Suffolk 1748
By Thomas GainsboroughSizes starting at $279.00Wooded Landscape with a boy leading a donkey and dog, and an extensive panorama with buildings and distant hills
By Thomas GainsboroughSizes starting at $279.00Going to Market, Early Morning
By Thomas GainsboroughSizes starting at $279.00Returning From Market
By Thomas GainsboroughSizes starting at $299.00Wooded Landscape with a Cottage and Shepherd
By Thomas GainsboroughSizes starting at $289.00Forest landscape with figures, bridge, donkeys, mountain
By Thomas GainsboroughSizes starting at $289.00View of Ipswich from Christchurch Park
By Thomas GainsboroughSizes starting at $309.00Drinkstone Park (The Woods of Cornard) 1747
By Thomas GainsboroughSizes starting at $269.00Landscape with Stream and Weir
By Thomas GainsboroughSizes starting at $269.00Rocky Landscape 1783
By Thomas GainsboroughSizes starting at $279.00Wooded Landscape with a Man Talking to Two Seated Women 1745
By Thomas GainsboroughSizes starting at $289.00Wooded Landscape with a Peasant Resting 1747
By Thomas GainsboroughSizes starting at $299.00Wooded Landscape with a Woodcutter
By Thomas GainsboroughSizes starting at $299.00Wooded Landscape with Cattle by a Pool
By Thomas GainsboroughSizes starting at $279.00View in Suffolk 1755
By Thomas GainsboroughSizes starting at $289.00The Watering Place
By Thomas GainsboroughSizes starting at $299.00A Grand Landscape
By Thomas GainsboroughSizes starting at $269.00Boy Driving Cows near a Pool 1786
By Thomas GainsboroughSizes starting at $289.00Landscape with Cattle 1773
By Thomas GainsboroughSizes starting at $279.00Elmsett Church, W. Suffolk
By Thomas GainsboroughSizes starting at $279.00Road from Market
By Thomas GainsboroughSizes starting at $299.00Rocky landscape with a bridge 1782
By Thomas GainsboroughSizes starting at $319.00View near King’s Bromley, on Trent, Staffordshire
By Thomas GainsboroughSizes starting at $299.00Holywells Park
By Thomas GainsboroughSizes starting at $299.00Seashore with Fishermen
By Thomas GainsboroughSizes starting at $299.00A coastal landscape
By Thomas GainsboroughSizes starting at $309.00Rocky Coastal Scene with a Ruined Castle, Boats and Fishermen
By Thomas GainsboroughSizes starting at $279.00Coastal Landscape with a Shepherd and His Flock
By Thomas GainsboroughSizes starting at $289.00Coastal Scene with Sailing and Rowing Boats and Figures on the Shore 1783
By Thomas GainsboroughSizes starting at $279.00A Coastal Landscape 1
By Thomas GainsboroughSizes starting at $289.00Coastal Scene with Shipping and Cattle
By Thomas GainsboroughSizes starting at $269.00A Traveller Seated on a Country Road, Holding a White Horse
By Thomas GainsboroughSizes starting at $299.00The Fallen Tree
By Thomas GainsboroughSizes starting at $259.00Treelike landscape with a resting shepherd by a sunny path and sheep
By Thomas GainsboroughSizes starting at $279.00Wooded landscape with peasants resting, and a distant cottage
By Thomas GainsboroughSizes starting at $269.00Landscape with a pool
By Thomas GainsboroughSizes starting at $269.00Woody Landscape with Building
By Thomas GainsboroughSizes starting at $289.00Wooded Rocky Landscape with Mounted Peasant, Drover and Cattle
By Thomas GainsboroughSizes starting at $279.00Wooded Upland Landscape 1783
By Thomas GainsboroughSizes starting at $279.00Wooded Landscape with Herdsman Seated
By Thomas GainsboroughSizes starting at $319.00Extensive Wooded Upland Landscape 1786
By Thomas GainsboroughSizes starting at $279.00Mountain Landscape with Bridge
By Thomas GainsboroughSizes starting at $269.00Landscape with Rustic Lovers, Two Cows, and a Man on a Distant Bridge
By Thomas GainsboroughSizes starting at $289.00Landscape- Sheep in a Woodland Glade
By Thomas GainsboroughSizes starting at $279.00Landscape with Cattle, a young man courting a milkmaid
By Thomas GainsboroughSizes starting at $279.00A View in Suffolk 1746
By Thomas GainsboroughSizes starting at $299.00Landscape with Cows
By Thomas GainsboroughSizes starting at $299.00Imaginary Landscape
By Thomas GainsboroughSizes starting at $289.00Landscape with a View of a Distant Village
By Thomas GainsboroughSizes starting at $389.00Rest by the Way 1747
By Thomas GainsboroughSizes starting at $309.00Landscape with Milkmaid
By Thomas GainsboroughSizes starting at $319.00Pastoral Landscape (Rocky Mountain Valley with a Shepherd, Sheep, and Goats) 1783
By Thomas GainsboroughSizes starting at $299.00