id: 130330 accession number: 1952.95 share license status: CC0 url: https://clevelandart.org/art/1952.95 updated: 2023-12-05 05:03:52.734000 Self-Portrait, 1802. John I Smart (British, 1741–1811). Watercolor on ivory in a gold frame; framed: 7 x 5.7 cm (2 3/4 x 2 1/4 in.); unframed: 6.9 x 5.4 cm (2 11/16 x 2 1/8 in.). The Cleveland Museum of Art, The Edward B. Greene Collection 1952.95 title: Self-Portrait title in original language: series: series in original language: creation date: 1802 creation date earliest: 1802 creation date latest: 1802 current location: creditline: The Edward B. Greene Collection copyright: --- culture: England, early 19th Century technique: watercolor on ivory in a gold frame department: Modern European Painting and Sculpture collection: Mod Euro - Painting 1800-1960 type: Portrait Miniature find spot: catalogue raisonne: --- CREATORS * John I Smart (British, 1741–1811) - artist John Smart is often regarded as the most skilled painter of portrait miniatures at the height of the art form’s popularity in late-eighteenth-century Britain. While the free style and white and blue color palette of his rival Richard Cosway (1742–1821) conjured up the glamour of fashionable society, Smart’s attention to minute detail, saturated colors, and frank conveyance of likeness and character attracted a different type of clientele, one who prized these qualities
above Cosway’s homogenized modishness.
Information is limited about Smart’s life and career, so much so that while G. C. Williamson had penned the definitive biographies of Cosway, George Engleheart (1752–1829), and Andrew Plimer (1763–1837) by 1905, it wasn’t until 1964 that a biography of Smart appeared. Little is known about the artist’s early training beyond evidence suggesting that before the age of fourteen, he was winning prizes from the Society of Arts for his drawings and, like Cosway, was an apprentice in William Shipley’s London school in St. Martin’s Lane. Smart exhibited for several years as an active member and eventually president of the Society of Artists of Great Britain before seeking his fortune as a miniature painter in India, where he lived between 1785 and 1795, hoping to secure patronage from wealthy princes and those
involved in England’s growing trade market. Works from this period are signed with the initial I, signifying India.
Unlike Cosway, an ostentatious showman, Smart lived and worked quietly, settling in London after his return from India and exhibiting at the Royal Academy. His style, which changed little throughout his career, is characterized by a meticulous description of a sitter’s countenance through the use of delicate stippling, often featuring wrinkles, crow’s feet around the eyes, and a slightly upturned mouth that suggests joviality. Unlike his contemporaries Cosway, Engleheart, and Plimer, whose backgrounds most often featured blue and white cloudy skies, Smart painted his backgrounds in varying shades of browns, greens, and grays. The size of the artist’s miniatures expanded over time, measuring around 11/ 2 inches until about 1775, then 2 inches until around 1790, and 3 inches thereafter. Though
highly sought after in his time, Smart’s work grew even more popular among collectors following his death. The Cleveland Museum of Art has a total of twenty-three portraits by Smart: seven gentlemen sitters painted on ivory and sixteen preparatory drawings of men and women. Of the seven miniatures on ivory, two date from 1770, three from
Smart’s years in India, and two after his 1795 return to London. --- measurements: Framed: 7 x 5.7 cm (2 3/4 x 2 1/4 in.); Unframed: 6.9 x 5.4 cm (2 11/16 x 2 1/8 in.) state of the work: edition of the work: support materials: inscriptions: inscription: signed left: J S / 1802 translation: remark: --- CURRENT EXHIBITIONS title: Intimate Images: Portrait Miniatures from Europe and America opening date: 1993-03-26T04:00:00 Intimate Images: Portrait Miniatures from Europe and America. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (March 26-October 17, 1993). title: Disembodied: Portrait Minatures and their Contemporary Relatives opening date: 2013-11-10T00:00:00 Disembodied: Portrait Minatures and their Contemporary Relatives. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (November 10, 2013-February 16, 2014). --- LEGACY EXHIBITIONS * Main Gallery Rotation (Gallery 202), The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (January 5, 2009 - April 6, 2009). * Main European Rotation (Gallery 202), The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (January 30, 2012 - July 23, 2012). [Verso on display] --- PROVENANCE Collection of the Artist, John Smart (1741-1811), by inheritance to his son, John James Smart date: 1802-1811 footnotes: citations: John James Smart (1805-1870), by inheritance to his daughter Mary Ann Bose date: 1811-1870 footnotes: citations: Mary Ann Bose (née Smart, 1856–1934), by inheritance to her son William H. Bose date: 1870-1934 footnotes: citations: William H. Bose (1875-1957) date: 1934-1945 footnotes: citations: (Sale: Christie's London, December 17, 1945, lot 18). date: December 17, 1945 footnotes: citations: Robert H. Rocklliff (d. 1963) date: 1945-1947 footnotes: citations: (Sale: Sotheby's London, November 11, 1945, lot 119). date: November 11, 1945 footnotes: citations: H.E. Backer, dealer, London, England on commission date: -1948 footnotes: citations: Dr. C.H. Samuelson, Greenacre, Exeter. England date: 1948- footnotes: citations: Edward B. Greene (1878-1957), Cleveland, OH, gifted to the Cleveland Museum of Art date: -1952 footnotes: citations: The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH date: 1952- footnotes: citations: --- fun fact: digital description: wall description: --- RELATED WORKS --- CITATIONS Christie, Manson & Woods. Miniatures, Objects of Art and Vertu. 1945. page number: Lot 18 url: Sotheby's (Firm). Fine Portrait Miniatures, Enamels and Snuff Boxes. 1947. page number: lot 119, pl. VI url: Cleveland Museum of Art, and Edward Belden Greene. Portrait Miniatures ; The Edward B. Greene Collection. 1951. page number: p. 30, no. 34, pl. IX url: Burchfield, Louise H. “Portrait Miniatures.” The Bulletin of the Cleveland Museum of Art 41, no. 2 (1954). page number: p. 22, 26 url: https://www.jstor.org/stable/25141936 “Three Paintings Recently Acquired.” Bulletin of the Museum of Fine Arts 52, no. 290 (1954). page number: p. 90 url: https://www.jstor.org/stable/4171186 Jaffé, Arthur. “John Smart, Miniature Painter—1741(?)–1811: His Life and Iconography.” Art Quarterly XVII, no. 3 (Autumn 1954). page number: fig. 10, pp. 249, 251, 254 url: Foskett, Daphne. John Smart: the Man and His Miniatures. [London]: Cory, Adams & Mackay, 1964. page number: fi g. 6 (repr.), pl. III url: Foskett, Daphne. A Dictionary of British Miniature Painters. London: Faber and Faber, 1972. page number: vol. 1, pp. 513–16; vol. II, no. 840, pl. 336 url: Cleveland Museum of Art, and Alan Chong. European & American Painting in the Cleveland Museum of Art: A Summary Catalogue. Cleveland, Ohio: Cleveland Museum of Art, 1993. page number: p. 305 url: Korkow, Cory, and Dario Robleto. Disembodied: Portrait Miniatures and Their Contemporary Relatives. 2013. page number: Mentioned: p. 81 url: Korkow, Cory, and Jon L. Seydl. British Portrait Miniatures: The Cleveland Museum of Art. 2013. page number: Cat. no. 34, pp. 156-159 url: Cleveland Museum of Art. The CMA Companion: A Guide to the Cleveland Museum of Art. Cleveland: Cleveland Museum of Art, 2014. page number: Mentioned and reproduced: P. 197 url: --- IMAGES web: https://openaccess-cdn.clevelandart.org/1952.95/1952.95_web.jpg print: https://openaccess-cdn.clevelandart.org/1952.95/1952.95_print.jpg full: https://openaccess-cdn.clevelandart.org/1952.95/1952.95_full.tif