THOMAS GAINSBOROUGH, R.A. (SUDBURY 1727-1788 LONDON)

The Nottinghamshire landowner Robert Sutton lived the traditional life of an eighteenth-century gentleman. After his education at Westminster and then Jesus College, Cambridge he spent some time on the continent, visiting Rome and then travelling South to Capua and Naples in 1753-54. Sadly, he suffered from poor health and moved to Bath in 1766 in the hopes that the waters would effect a cure; it was here that he would have sat to Gainsborough. His memorial tablet in Bath Abbey describes his ‘polished Manners, Inflexible Integrity, and warmest benevolence of heart’ (cited H. Belsey, loc. cit., p. 795). The number of pentimenti present in Sutton’s portrait show the artist’s thought process during the painting process. Both the hat and the chair back have been painted over the top of the red coat, indicating that they were not part of the original conception of the portrait. The pose, with the arm hooked over the back of the chair, is reminiscent of portraits by Francis Hayman, one of Gainsborough’s teachers at the Saint Martin’s Lane Academy prior to his move to Bath in 1758-59.