James Barry
(1741 - 1806) |
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Historical Narratives, Portraiture Art Work
| Name: |
James Barry |
| Gender: |
Male |
| Place of Birth: |
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| Nationality: |
British |
| Birth: |
1741 |
| Death: |
1806 |
| Website: |
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| Past Auctions: |
Click Here |
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Quick Facts
| Known For: |
Historical Narratives, Portraiture |
| Medium: |
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| Method: |
Engraving |
| Style: |
Neoclassical |
| Fine Art Profession(s): |
Painting
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Biography
| James Barry was known as a heroic history painter and, occasionally and very reluctantly, portrait painter with a very Irish temperament. Born in humble circumstances in Cork, he taught himself to paint by copying prints and anything he could lay hands on and went to Dublin, 1763, with some historical compositions he had invented. These seem to have been impressive and he was brought to the attention of Edmund Burke, who became his sponsor and mentor. After a little study under Robert West in Dublin, Burke persuaded him to come to London in 1764, and introduced him to Reynolds and James 'Athenian' Stuart, who encouraged him and perhaps innocently fanned his lofty aspirations. He was certainly both talented and precocious. Burke financed a journey to Rome, via Paris, in 1766, where Barry remained until 1770, doing little painting but studying the great masters and the Antique intensively. He returned via Florence, Bologna (where he presented his 'Philoctetes' to the Accademia Clementina) and Venice. He exhibited a number of impressive history pictures, such as 'The Death of Cordelia1, 1774 (Tate Gallery). In 1776 he exhibited some portraits (Burke and himself) in the character of 'Ulysses and his companions escaping from Polyphemus' (Cork Art Gallery), and a 'Death of Wolfe' (New Brunswick), which was unfavorably criticized, so that he never exhibited again. He seems to have acquired the reputation of being the most distinguished history painter of the time, but schemes for decorating St. Paul's and the Society of Arts jointly with others collapsed, and he offered to paint pictures himself, without remuneration, for the walls of the great room of the (Royal) Society of Arts. These six huge canvases illustrating 'The Progress of Civilisation' occupied him from 1777 to 1783. They are not only his major achievement, but the finest example of historical painting in Britain produced in this century. Barry wrote an explanatory booklet on them, and there is no doubt that, in spite of certain incongruities, the intellectual effort involved was as considerable as the technical. They were generally admired but did not lead to commissions. Barry was made Professor of Painting at the RA in 1782, but he was dilatory about preparing his lectures and, when he did give them, devoted much time to vituperating his colleagues. His bad temper and language and generally difficult nature caused the Academy to expel him in 1799 from the Chair and their number. His later years were largely devoted to a vast, unfinished 'Pandora' (Manchester). He loathed portraits, but when he painted them, they are always remarkable - notably a 'Self portrait' (Dublin) completed in 1803 from an earlier picture. |
Samples of Work
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