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Eighteenth-century glam
Thomas Gainsborough at the MFA
BY RANDI HOPKINS

Plumed hats, silk gowns, and light-flecked backgrounds flatter the elegant subjects of Thomas Gainsborough’s high fashion portraits in "Thomas Gainsborough 1727-1788," which opens in the Gund Gallery at the Museum of Fine Arts on this Sunday. Best-known for his portrait of young "Blue Boy" Jonathan Buttall (which seems almost a parody of mannered society depiction), Gainsborough in fact pushed the portraiture envelope by painting subjects in contemporary clothing rather than draped in classical garb, as was all the rage in his day.

"Gainsborough came to prominence at a very interesting time," explains Frederick Ilchman, assistant curator of paintings in the MFA’s Art of Europe Department. Ilchman curated the Boston incarnation of this exhibition, which originated at the Tate Britain in London. Describing 18th-century London, he says, "New arts institutions were being founded, giving artists great public exposure for the first time, art criticism was newly emerging, and there was growing wealth in England overall. But Protestant England was not so comfortable with religious art, so artists had to make their mark through portraiture." With his famously loose brushwork and astonishing ability to capture a sitter’s likeness, Gainsborough became one of the most sought-after portrait painters of the late 18th century.

Born in Sudbury in 1727, Gainsborough went to London when he was only 13 years old to train with French engraver Gravelot, who was known for bringing the curlicued French rococo style to England. After stints back in Sudbury and later in the Suffolk port town of Ipswich, Gainsborough made a canny move west to the fashionable spa city of Bath, which teemed with wealthy tourists who quickly recognized not only his talent for portrayals dripping with aristocratic ease and glamor but also his gift for accurate likeness.

The centerpiece of the MFA’s exhibition will be a room featuring 19 of Gainsborough’s full-length portraits, including The Linley Sisters (1772), which shows two lovely sisters from a well-known Bath musical family handsomely depicted in a wooded setting. Gainsborough, who is said to have preferred the company of musicians and actors to his elite patrons, was an enthusiastic amateur musician himself and frequently painted musicians with instruments at hand. The MFA will include authentic period musical instruments in this exhibition so that, as Ilchman points out, "viewers can see that Gainsborough really knew his instruments and can enjoy comparing the two."

Gainsborough also enjoyed painting landscapes as an escape from his portrait work, which he referred to as "the cursed face business." More often painted from imagination than from life, these will likewise be featured in the MFA’s sweeping show.

HIP TO BE SQUARE? The J. Geils Band, the Boston Tea Party rock club, and the folk coffeehouse Club 47 were a little before my time, but amateur photographer Steve Nelson had a front-row seat on the scene here in the late ’60s and early ’70s from his vantage point making sandals and hawking underground newspapers in Harvard Square by day and producing rock concerts by night. His snapshots of this rockin’ era bring it to life with never-before-seen photos of Peter Wolf and Jonathan Richmond next to images of forlorn George McGovern campaign posters and anonymous hippies selling the Phoenix. Get a sneak preview at www.snpix.com, then catch "The Square: Stills from the Scene, Harvard Square and Cambridge, 1967-1973" at the New England School of Art & Design when it opens next Thursday.

"Thomas Gainsborough 1727-1788" is at the Museum of Fine Arts, 465 Huntington Avenue, June 15 through September 14. Time-and-date-specific tickets are required; call (617) 267-9300. "The Square: Stills from the Scene, Harvard Square and Cambridge, 1967-1973" is at the New England School of Art & Design, 75 Arlington Street, June 19 through July 18; call (617) 573-8785.

Issue Date: June 13 - 19, 2003

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