Nathaniel DANCE-HOLLAND (1735 - 1811)

Portrait of Phillip, 6th Viscount Wenman (1719–1760)

oil on canvas

47 x 37 inches, inc. frame

Price: £15,000 GBP

Sir Nathaniel Dance-Holland was an English portrait painter and one of the founding members of the Royal Academy in 1768.

Justly celebrated in his lifetime he won several important commissions and painted figures as diverse as King George III, Captain James Cook and the renowned actor David Garrick. After a painting career of great success, in 1790, he gave up art and became a Member of Parliament for East Grinstead in Sussex. He was made a baronet in 1800, which became extinct upon his death in 1811.

This painting depicts Philip Wenman, the sixth Viscount Wenman (1719–1760), a Tory politician. His notable achievement was being Member of Parliament for the city of Oxford. The Wenman family was closely tied to the High Tory interest which dominated Oxfordshire county politics during the first half of the eighteenth century. Continuing this tradition, Wenman represented the party in the memorably heated election of 1754 between the Tories and the Whigs, who were trying to disrupt the Tory stronghold.