Charles Exshaw
, English, fl.1747-1771
Title
Portrait of a ManDate1760
MediumOil on canvas
Dimensions
76 x 61 cm
Signedcentre left: C. Exshaw, fet 1766
Credit LinePurchased, 1972
Object numberNGI.4056
DescriptionIn 1760, the year this half-length portrait was painted, Exshaw was based in London and then Amsterdam. The sitter, who looks out towards the viewer, has a haughty, aristocratic air, conveyed by the upward tilt of his chin. His desire to appear learned is evinced by the prominence given to the book he grips firmly in his left hand and by the inclusion of a bookcase on the left side.The sitter is clearly a gentleman of high rank, presented in his military-style pink coat with silver frogging and silver pinchbeck buttons. His unpowdered tie-back wig, worn quite high on the head, was of a type fashionable in the mid-eighteenth century. His accoutrements are revivalist in style, in keeping with costume of the seventeenth-century, and may have been borrowed from an earlier family portrait. The exquisitely painted blue mantle loosely draped over his left arm was certainly outdated by 1760.
In the course of his career, Exshaw produced history paintings, landscapes and portraits and experimented with a variety of print-making techniques. His engravings in particular show the influence of time spent in Amsterdam and a debt to the work of Rembrandt.