Silly Old Twit

Painted in 1775 this is one of the more popular paintings in the collection of The National Gallery of Ireland. Measuring 145 cm by 173 cm and originally called “The Pictorial Conjurer displaying the Whole Art of Optical Deception” the picture is a direct attack on Sir Joshua Reynolds the then president of The Royal Academy.
In 1774 Reynolds in a lecture to the academy at a prize giving ceremony argued the importance of copying not just from nature but from the old masters as well. A year later Hone produced this picture but it was rejected by the academy although it had originally been accepted until a complaint from the artist Angelica Kauffman in which she claimed that she had been represented as a nude in the top left of the picture. This however was really just a ruse and the real complainant was Reynolds. Hone later painted out the nude figures and went on to exhibit the painting at no.70 St. Martins Lane in London where it probable recieved more notice than it might have if it had been exhibited at the academy. This is believed to be the first one man show in Britain. A sketch in oils for the painting is to be seen in The Tate Gallery , London.
This is not the only time that Hone had trouble with the academy over one of his pictures. In 1770 The Royal Academy asked him to make changes to one of his paintings in which a Capuchin Friar while seated at a table could be seen stirring a bowl of punch with a crucifix.

Top picture is the sketch in The Tate Gallery and the bottom is from the book Irish Paintings in the National Gallery of Ireland. (see previous post). See also Fra Angelico.