John Wollaston

English, c. 1710 - 1775, active in America, c. 1736-1769

BiographyEnglish painter, active in the USA. Horace Walpole mentioned in his Anecdotes of Painting in England (1765) that a London portrait painter, John Woolston, had a son who also became a portrait painter. From works that this son painted in London in 1744, it appears that he changed the spelling of his last name to Wollaston. The American painter Charles Willson Peale in a letter of 1812 to his son referred to Wollaston’s training with a London drapery painter, but the portraits he was producing by the time he reached New York reflect abilities beyond those of a drapery painter. They are three-quarter-lengths showing little else than the subject, sombrely dressed. This style continued throughout his stay in New York (1749–51), with a growing concentration on fine apparel. The elegant dress of the females and subdued refinements of male attire advertise wealth and status. Despite a heavy reliance on engravings for pose and composition, his best portraits possess an animation about the mouth and eyes. His peculiar treatments of the eyes, slanted almond shapes, and rich fabrics in a range of colours that were touched with subtle highlights, identify even his unsigned portraits, for example John Dies (c. 1750; Amherst Coll., MA, Mead A. Mus.; see Craven, p. 29). Appearing in some late New York portraits is the suggestion of landscape. Judging from the number of such works that survive, at least 75, he was eagerly sought after.

In the spring of 1753 Wollaston moved to Annapolis, MD. Recorded as living there from around March 1753 until August 1754, he completed at least 55 individual portraits. Such prolific activity and the larger size of the paintings might suggest that these clients enjoyed greater wealth than their New York neighbours. Theirs now commonly included objects in the hands of his sitters, such as books for the men and flowers for the women. There are also c. 100 paintings of similar size featuring colonists in Virginia, where Wollaston seems to have painted from c. 1755 until October 1757. It appears from records that in late 1757 he accepted a position with the British East India Company and moved to Philadelphia, perhaps in search of transportation. While there he completed at least a dozen portraits before March 1759. Indications are that Wollaston’s work in India, primarily legal in nature, made him wealthy. He reappeared in America briefly in late 1766 or very early 1767, painting portraits in Charleston, SC. In these, the expressionless stare that confronts the viewer is of much less importance than how closely the sitters’ costumes imitates those of their wealthy English cousins. The South Carolina Gazette announced Wollaston’s departure for England in late May 1767. His popularity in the colonies led to many copies of his work and imitation by several artists. Among his admirers were Benjamin West, who was impressed with Wollaston’s New York portraits, and John Hesselius, who for a period borrowed elements of his style. Even Charles Willson Peale, while working in Annapolis as a saddler’s apprentice (1754–61), found inspiration in his paintings.

Darryl Patrick. "Wollaston, John." In Grove Art Online. Oxford Art Online, http://www.oxfordartonline.com.proxy.lib.fsu.edu/subscriber/article/grove/art/T092057 (accessed May 2, 2012).

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