The three humans gaze upon each other while the macaw gazes the opposite directions, which provides a bit of balance to the image. To the side of the mother and sons rests the artist’s macaw bird just in front of dark red curtains and a column that opens to show a bright blue sky and hills in the far background. In Reynolds depiction he places Lady Cockburn in a chair slightly off center holding two of her young sons, the third holding onto her back, shrouded in lush golden trimmed fabric. The portrait of Lady Cockburn was a commissioned portrait by the Lady who was very wealthy, which could explain why she is depicted based upon the revered 17th century work “Charity’ by Van Dyck.
According to the National Gallerys website “Through study of ancient and Italian Renaissance art, and of the work of Rembrandt, Rubens and Van Dyck, he brought great variety and dignity to British portraiture.” He was one of the more educated painters of his time period and was elected the first president of the Royal Academy of art when it opened. The first piece we viewed was “ Lady Cockburn and her Three Eldest Sons” by Reynolds, who was famous for his portraits in the later 18th century. Armed with worksheets pointing our key areas of notice from our professors we set out to view and analyze the works that were on display by these four artists in room 34 of the National Gallery. We mainly focused on four artists of the period, Reynolds, Gainsborough, Turner and Constable, which were revered for being in the canon of their time. Friday the 12th of September our small class travelled to the National Gallery at Trafalgar Square to view some of the collections British art from the period 1750 to 1850.
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