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A Portrait of Sir Richard Sprignell When a Boy
A Portrait of Sir Richard Sprignell When a Boy

A Portrait of Sir Richard Sprignell When a Boy

Maker (Dutch, 1618 - 1680, active in England)
ClassificationsPAINTINGS
Dateca. 1648
Mediumoil on canvas
Dimensionsoval: 30 × 25 in. (76.2 × 63.5 cm.) frame (oval): 36 1/4 × 31 3/4 × 4 1/2 in. (92.1 × 80.6 × 11.4 cm.)
Credit LineThe Huntington Library, Art Museum, and Botanical Gardens. Gift of John and Mary Ann Sturgeon
Status
On view
Label TextLely creates a contemplative mood by painting his young subject against a lush backdrop of dark foliage, his right hand resting on a book. Though his identity is unsure, the sitter has long been thought to be Richard Sprignell, the younger brother of Anne Sprignell, a noblewoman who lived in Cromwell House, near London, in the middle of the 17th century. An early 19th-century chronicler relates that “Of her brother, who died in his youth, Sir Peter Lely has painted a Portrait, which is now in [her son’s] collection, and is a chef oeuvre of that exquisite Artist.”
Object number2009.20
    The Huntington
    Copyright © The Huntington