George Barret Sr. ( – 29 May 1784) was an Irish landscape artist known for his oil paintings and watercolours. He left Ireland in 1762 to establish himself as an artist in London and quickly gained recognition to become a leading artist of the period. He exhibited at the Society of Artists of Great Britain and was able to gain patronage from many leading art collectors. Barrett with other leading members left the Society in 1768 to found the Royal Academy, where he continued to exhibit until 1782.Bodkin (1920), p. 8
Barrett appears to have travelled extensively in England including the Lake District and the Isle of Wight, Wales, and Scotland to undertake commissions for his patrons, but he does not appear to have travelled abroad. Oil paintings of Tivoli in Italy have been attributed to him, but it is much more likely that they are the work of his son George Barret Jr. He suffered from asthma and this caused him to move in 1772 to Westbourne Green, at the time a country village to the west of Paddington.
While he earned considerable wealth from his paintings, he has been described as being "feckless" with money. He was helped in 1782 by Edmund Burke, with whom he had become friends when Burke attended Trinity College, Dublin. On Burke's recommendation he obtained the appointment of master painter of Chelsea Hospital, a post he held until his death in 1784. At the time of his death his widow and children we left destitute, but the Royal Academy granted her a pension of thirty pounds a year.
Life Early life in Ireland
Born in Dublin, the son of a cloth merchant, some time between 1728 and 1732, Barret began his career apprenticed to a staymaker. By 1747 he had started learning to draw at Robert West's academy at George's Lane which was sponsored by Dublin Society, and later studied under James Mannin.
After completing his studies he taught drawing at the Academy. He was a friend of Edmund Burke while Burke was an undergraduate at Trinity College, Dublin. In 1757 Burke published A Philosophical Enquiry into the Origin of Our Ideas of the Sublime and Beautiful, and the influence of Burke's thinking can be detected in some of Barret's early paintings, such as the Powerscourt Waterfall. A version of this painting in the Walker Art Gallery in Liverpool is said to have been painted for Edmund Burke.Bodkin p. 76
Italianate paintings Early in his career Barret produced many oil paintings of classical scenery, often incorporating mythological figures. There is no evidence that he travelled to Italy.Ingamels J (1997) A Dictionary of British and Irish Travellers in Italy, 1701–1800, Yale. Most, if not all, of the paintings appear to have been commissioned for houses in Ireland. Thomas Bodkin considered that the oil paintings of Tivoli in Italy to be more likely to be work of his son George Barret junior. who also produced many works with classical themes. However, these can now be securely attributed to the elder Barret.
A source of Barret's earliest landscape paintings came from the re-working of engravings of classical Italianate scenes of artists such as Claude Lorrain. A pair of paintings sold in 2013, came from the collection of the Rev. Samuel Madden (1686–1765). Madden established a series of prizes at Trinity College, Dublin, to reward agricultural and artistic enterprise, designed an important landscape garden on the shores of Lough Erne, founded the Dublin (later Royal) Society, and left an important collection of 17th- and 18th-century Italian pictures to Trinity College.Rev. Samuel Madden These two paintings were based on engravings of two paintings by Claude Lorrain. One of these is after Landscape with a rural dance, which belonged to the Duke of Kingston. The second is a Landscape with Argus guarding Io, purchased by the first Earl of Leicester and still at Holkham Hall, in which Barret has reversed the image in his painting. There are a number of other Italianate paintings showing ruins which Barret probably painted before developing his series of Irish landscapes.
Barret's first major patron was probably Joseph Leeson, 1st Earl of Milltown, who built the Palladian mansion, Russborough House in the southern part of County Wicklow.Richard Cassels was the architect and the house was furnished by Joseph Leeson, who travelled on grand tours of Europe in 1744 and again in 1750, amassing a large art collection of paintings, sculpture, furniture, and antiques. This was augmented by classical landscapes and local landscapes. Barret's paintings were used as a decorative scheme in the newly created dining roomCountry Life, Vol.LXXXI, 30/01/1937, p. 120 Many of Barret's paintings passed with the Milltown bequest to the National Gallery of Ireland in 1902. Another source that was used extensively by Barret were engravings by Piranesi which were published in 1748 in Antichita romane de' tempi della Repubblica, e de' primi imperatori. A landscape commissioned by Lord Bective for Headfort, Kells, Couty Meath is based on the Tempietto del Clitunno a temple on the river Clitunnonear Spoleto, in central Umbria, north of Rome.
Irish patrons
Following work for Samuel Madden and the Earl of Milltown, Barret started to produce paintings of Irish landscapes. These portrayed the actual landscape and not capriccio scenery. This was a natural progression from his previous idealised Italianate scenery. Barret is particularly associated with Edward Wingfield who in 1751 became Viscount Powerscourt.Bodkin p. 2 Wingfield owned Powerscourt House and extensive estates to the south of Dublin in County Wicklow. These included the scenic river Dargle with its craggy red rocks and impressive Powerscourt Waterfall that is the second highest in Ireland. Scenery on the Dargle often figures in Barret's surviving oil paintings and he also painted at Avoca in the south of County Wicklow.There is a landscape view of Avoca in the National Gallery of Ireland, Bodkin p. 76 A View of Powerscourt House under the Sugar Loaf Mountain is now at the Yale Center for British Art, and a version of Barret's Powerscourt Waterfall is in the National Gallery of Ireland.National Gallery of Ireland, Irish Paintings in the National Gallery of Ireland, I, Dublin, 2001, pp.43-6, no. 174, illustrated
Barret was likely introduced to the Marquess of Rockingham by Edmund Burke, who had become his private secretary. The Marquess' s Irish seat was at Coolatin, County Wicklow. Barret was employed to draw the remains of Killtimon Castle, County Wicklow, and a copy after his drawing survives in the Royal Irish AcademyA. Crookshank and the Knight of Glin, (2002) Ireland's Painters 1600–1940 London and New Haven, pp 134-5 An oil painting by Barret, with a wooded mountainous river landscape with anglers by a waterfall in the foreground and a ruined tower house in the distance, which relates to these views, was sold in 2003.Christie's Auctions
A further Irish patron of Barret was the Thomas Conolly of Castletown House of Celbridge to the west of Dublin. He inherited Castletown House in 1758 and his wife Lady Louisa Conolly (who was the daughter of Charles Lennox, 2nd Duke of Richmond), set about redecoration and refurbishment of this Palladian mansion. Barret supplied a painting of the house in the distance with wooded parkland and a river. The trees are depicted in outline and not in Barret's later spindly way. John Harris remarks that it is softly and atmospherically painted, and of course, is free from the influence of Wilson and other London based painters.Harris, p. 284, Pl. 310. As he could not find adequate employment in Ireland, Barret moved to London in 1762.Bodkin p. 5
Move to England and patronage
Following his move to London in 1762 Barrett rapidly established himself as the leading landscape artist working in oil paint. In 1764 he was exhibiting at both the Free Society of Artists and the Society of Artists of Great Britain. Barret was awarded the premium prize of 50 guineas for the Large Landscape with Figures which he exhibited at the Free Society exhibition in 1764, and this was purchased a year later by the Marquess of Rockingham for £100 guineas. At the Society of Artists he displayed four paintings including views on the Dargle and Powerscourt Waterfall, paintings that he must have brought with him from Ireland.Bodkin lists all of Barret's exhibited pictures at both of these Societies and also at the Royal Academy in his Appendix iii- Bodkin, pp. 76-79
In 1768 a rift developed in the Society of Artists of Great Britain. A faction led by Sir William Chambers, at the suggestion of Barret, petitioned the King for the foundation of the Royal Academy. Barret is mentioned as a nominated member in the foundation document.Bodkin, p. 5 Barret specialised particularly in wild and mountainous natural landscapes; of the 31 paintings he showed at the Royal Academy between 1769 and 1782, more than a third depicted such scenery. He very occasionally undertook portraits, an example of which is the portrait of William Constable at Burton Constable Hall. He also painted a number of pictures of animals such as the water spaniel belonging to Lord Edward Bentinck, that was exhibited at the Society of Artists of Great Britain in 1768.Bodkin, p.78
On arriving in London Barret was able to build on the contacts that he had made in Ireland and particularly with the political faction that had grown up around Marquess of Rockingham known as the Rockinghamites or Rockingham Whigs. Rockingham was to become prime minister in 1765–1766 and again in 1782. The connection was through Edmund Burke, Rockingham's private secretary and prominent Rockinghamites who commissioned paintings from Barrett were the Duke of Portland, the Earl of Albemarle and Sir George Colebrook. His patrons were mainly the rich landowner who wished to have their estates and parks recorded. Barret soon found himself with numerous commissions and it was rumoured that he was earning up £2000 a year, a princely sum for an artist at the time.Bodkin, p. 6 Contemporary accounts suggest that Barret was a highly sociable character and got on well with people and other artists. Even though Richard Wilson made disparaging remarks about both Barret and Gainsborough at the same time, Bodkin maintains that Wilson and Barret were personal friends. It is noticeable that many of the landowners who patronised Barret were in the process of building impressive new mansions which would require large oil paintings to decorate the reception rooms. The Duke of Portland at Welbeck Abbey, Sir Peter Byrne Leicester at Tabley House and the Marquess of Rockingham were all employing Carr of York as an architect and this may provide a link between his early commissions after Barret arrived from Ireland.
The Duke of Portland commissioned a dozen paintings of trees and the landscape at Welbeck Abbey from Barrett. The paintings were undertaken between 1765 and 1771 and Barret was paid 80 guineas for the largest paintings, 60 guineas for the middle sized and 40 guineas for the smaller paintings."Goulding and Adams" 426 Most of these paintings are now on display at the Portland Gallery at Welbeck.
Sir Peter Byrne Leicester.