Self-portrait at the age of sixty-four

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Self-portrait at the age of sixty-four thumbnail 1

Request to view at the Prints & Drawings Study Room, level H , Case PD, Shelf 202, Box A

Artist/Maker	Richardson, Jonathan (The Elder) (artist)
Place of origin	London (drawn)

The portraitist and influential art theorist Jonathan Richardson valued drawings highly, and built a great collection of examples by old masters. Richardson believed that portraits should ‘reveal the mind as well as the visual appearance’ of the sitter. After his retirement he drew a small portrait of himself virtually every day, not so much as an exercise in recording his appearance, but as a method of self-analysis. These were not made for display but to be kept in albums where they formed a kind of visual memoir.

Object details

Category	Drawings
Object type	Drawing
Title	Self-portrait at the age of sixty-four
Materials and techniques	Graphite on vellum
Brief description	Jonathan Richardson the elder (1667-1745); self-portrait at the age of 64, 1731. Graphite on vellum.
Physical description	Drawing.
Dimensions	Height: 10.16cm Width: 7.62cm
Style	English School
Subject depicted	Self-Portrait
Summary	The portraitist and influential art theorist Jonathan Richardson valued drawings highly, and built a great collection of examples by old masters. Richardson believed that portraits should ‘reveal the mind as well as the visual appearance’ of the sitter. After his retirement he drew a small portrait of himself virtually every day, not so much as an exercise in recording his appearance, but as a method of self-analysis. These were not made for display but to be kept in albums where they formed a kind of visual memoir.
Bibliographic references	Owens, Susan, The Art of Drawing British Masters and Methods since 1600, V&A Publishing, London, 2013, p. 57, fig. 36 Carol Gibson-Wood, Jonathan Richardson: Art Theorist of the English Enlightenment (New Haven and London, 2000), pp.120-121.
Collection	Prints, Drawings & Paintings Collection
Accession number	D.160-1886

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Record created	June 30, 2009
Record URL	https://collections.vam.ac.uk/item/O618393/self-portrait-at-the-age-drawing-richardson-jonathan-the/

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