Chandos portrait
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The "Chandos" portrait is one of the most famous of the portraits that may depict William Shakespeare (1564–1616). The portrait is named after James Brydges, 1st Duke of Chandos, the first documented owner of the portrait. The portrait was given to the National Portrait Gallery, London on its foundation in 1856 and the oil painting is listed as number one in its collection, being its first acquisition.
It has not been possible to solve the question of who painted the portrait, nor whether it really depicts Shakespeare. A contemporary image of the playwright is the engraving in the posthumously-published First Folio of 1623, which was created by Martin Droeshout and probably was commissioned by Shakespeare's friends and family. It is considered likely that the Droeshout engraving is a reasonably accurate likeness because of the use by these close associates and that contemporaries such as Ben Jonson praised it at the time of the publication.[1] Since the man in the Chandos portrait resembles the one in the Droeshout engraving, the similarity lends an indirect legitimacy to the oil painting.
It has been claimed that Shakespeare's friend Richard Burbage (1567–1619) painted the Chandos portrait, but the first known reference to the panting is in a note by George Vertue, who states that it was painted by John Taylor, a respected member of the Painter-Stainers' company.[2] Vertue also states that before the Duke of Chandos acquired it, the portrait was owned by Shakespeare's godson, William Davenant (1606–1668),[2] who, according to the gossip chronicler John Aubrey, claimed to be the playwright's illegitimate son.[3]
In 2006, Tarnya Cooper of the National Portrait Gallery completed a three-and-a-half-year study of portraits purported to be of Shakespeare and concluded that the Chandos portrait was most likely a representation of Shakespeare. Cooper points to the earring and the loose shirt-ties of the sitter, which were emblematic of poets (the poet John Donne and Shakespeare's patron the Earl of Pembroke sported similar fashions), however, she acknowledges readily that the painting's authenticity cannot be proven.[4]
The Chandos portrait was the inspiration for a grander, more embellished, mid-seventeenth century imaginary portrait, called the "Chesterfield portrait" after a former owner of that painting. The Chesterfield portrait is held by The Shakespeare Birthplace Trust in Stratford-upon-Avon.
[edit] References
- ^ Cooper, Tarnya; Pointon, Marcia; Shapiro, James; Wells, Stanley (2006). Searching for Shakespeare. Yale University Press, 48. ISBN 030011611X.
- ^ a b Cooper et al., 54.
- ^ Powell, Anthony (2005). Some Poets, Artists & 'A Reference for Mellors'. Timewell Press, 30. ISBN 1857252101.
- ^ Higgins, Charlotte (2006-03-02). "The only true painting of Shakespeare - probably", The Guardian. Retrieved on 2008-07-13.
