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Artists in 60 Seconds: Thomas Gainsborough

By , About.com Guide

Photo © V&A Images/Victoria & Albert Museum, London; used with permission

Thomas Gainsborough (English, 1727-1788) The Painter's Daughters, ca. 1758 Oilsketching on canvas 40.6 x 58.4 cm (16 x 23 in.) The Forster Bequest Victoria and Albert Museum, London

Photo © V&A Images/Victoria & Albert Museum, London

Movement, Style, School or Type of Art:

Rococo > Romanticism

Date and Place of Birth:

(Baptized) May 14, 1727, Sudbury, England

Life:

Gainsborough is best known for his prolific output of fancy portraits, though he himself said that landscapes were his true pleasure. He was in great demand as a portrait artist, and moved through the years from heads and half-lengths, to full-lengths, to groups. His subjects, too, were increasingly important people.

Important Works:

  • Mr. and Mrs. Robert Andrews, 1748-50
  • The Blue Boy, 1770
  • Ann Ford (Mrs. Philip Thicknesse), 1781
  • Mrs. Sarah Siddons, 1785
  • Market Cart, 1787

Date and Place of Death:

August 2, 1788, London

Quotes From Thomas Gainsborough:

  • "Confound the nose, there's no end to it!"

  • "I'll not take any thing for it but give (it) to you to twang upon when you can't twang upon Mrs Jackson." - written to his friend William Jackson, in reference to a harp.

Sources and Further Reading

  • Hayes, John. Gainsborough (exh. cat.).
    London : Tate Gallery, 1980-81.

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  • Hayes, John. Gainsborough: Paintings and Drawings
    London : Phaidon, 1975.

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  • Kitson, Michael. "Thomas Gainsborough"
    The Oxford Companion to Western Art.
    Ed. Hugh Brigstocke. Oxford University Press, 2001.
    Grove Art Online. Oxford University Press, 5 June 2005.

  • Rosenthal, Michael (ed.), et al. Thomas Gainsborough.
    New York : Harry N Abrams, 2003.

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  • Rosenthal, Michael. "Gainsborough, Thomas"
    Grove Art Online. Oxford University Press, 5 June 2005.

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