Sir Christopher Wren : $b Scientist, scholar and architectWeaver, Lawrence
History
Sir Christopher Wren : $b Scientist, scholar and architect
Weaver, Lawrence
Architects -- England -- Biography; Wren, Christopher, Sir, 1632-1723
(_f_) _The St. Paul’s Deanery Portrait_ (Plate XIV.).--This is a
copy of the best known portrait of all, the Kneller at the National
Portrait Gallery, and an inferior copy, for it reveals a man of far
less distinction, both in character and feature, than the National
portrait. The latter is attributed to the year 1711, and is therefore
of Wren when he was nearly eighty.
(_g_) _The Welbeck Portrait_ (Plate IV.).--The picture is a small
whole length on panel. The architect wears a red dressing-gown
with white lining, white stockings, and red shoes; his right hand
is placed on his hip, and in his left hand he holds a drawing of
the elevation of the façade of St. Paul’s. On the left side of the
picture there is a lurid sky indicative of the burning of the City;
in the right-hand top corner is a bust of Charles II., flanked
by an amorino weighing the insignia of royalty (crown, sceptre,
etc.), against four shields of arms (England, France, Scotland, and
Ireland), and round the waist of the amorino is a scroll lettered
“Justum est.”
This picture was acquired by the fifth Duke of Portland in 1861.
It was then attributed to H. Gascar, who is stated to have been in
England _circa_ 1674-80, and who might consequently have painted Sir
Christopher soon after he made his design for the new Cathedral. The
West Front is shown in the picture with the single Order, an early
stage of the design. The architect looks very young for a man of
about forty-two years of age, but in the case of painted portraits it
is often difficult to reconcile the actual age of a sitter with his
_apparent_ age.
(_h_) _The Queen’s College Bust._--This posthumous portrait has been
attributed to Rysbrack; it is certainly worthy of him. Wren is shown
as a very old man.
(_k_) _The Medal at Wadham College_ (Plate XVI.).--As it is commonly
said that this medal was struck to celebrate the completion of St.
Paul’s, it is a little unkind to have to set down the fact that it
was cast and chased (not struck) by G. D. Gaale, a German, about the
year 1783, when he exhibited it in London, sixty years after Wren’s
death in 1723.
(_l_) _Art Union of London Medal._--A medal was issued in 1846:
obverse, with bust of Wren, signed H. Wilson, Sc.; reverse, St.
Paul’s, signed B. Wyon.
I hope the above notes may lead people better informed than myself to
bring out facts which will enable a full and correct catalogue of Wren
portraits to be prepared. Their publication in the Bicentenary issue of
_Architecture_ brought Mr. Richard W. Goulding to my aid in correcting
some mistakes I then made, and he has added the facts about the Welbeck
portrait.
A list of engravings after the Kneller portrait is given in Mr. F.
O’Donoghue’s “Catalogue of Engraved English Portraits in the British
Museum.”
INDEX
Abbey, Westminster, Wren and, 137, 138, 139
Aims of architecture, Wren on the, 153
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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