John James Masquerier
John James Masquerier (5 October 1778 – 1855) was a British painter with French Hugenot parents.[1] His work was mainly portrait painting, including of notables such as Lady Hamilton.
Life
He was born at Chelsea, London in October 1778, the son of French parents, his mother's name being Barbot, and on both sides descended from French refugee Protestant families. Masquerier studied at the Royal Academy (he enrolled in the Schools on 31 December 1792 aged 14) and painted a portrait of himself as a boy (later in the collection of Baroness Burdett Coutts), which was shown to George III, and gained for him a travelling allowance from the Royal Academy, which enabled him to go to Paris to study.
About 1789 he settled with his mother in the Champs-Elysées, while he studied painting under François Vincent at the Tuileries. He was painting in this school at the time of the murder of the Swiss Guards on 10 August 1792, but escaped with his life. Masquerier made sketches from personal observation of many events of the French Revolution, such as the murder of the Princesse de Lamballe and the trial of the king, and was acquainted with some of leading figures. In 1793, when the arrest was imminent of all English residents in France, he and his mother tried to leave Paris. His mother was, however, arrested and imprisoned with Helen Maria Williams and others. She owed her life and liberty to the fall of Robespierre and the events of the 10 Thermidor.
Masquerier returned to London, and subsequently entered the studio of John Hoppner, R.A., many of whose pictures he completed. In 1793 he visited the Isle of Wight, where he was the guest of John Wilkes. In 1795 he began his professional career as an artist, and in 1796 exhibited for the first time at the Royal Academy, sending a portrait and ‘The Incredulity of St. Thomas;’ the latter formed the altar-piece of the chapel (once the hall of the house of Lord-chief-justice George Jeffreys) in Duke Street, Westminster. In 1800 Masquerier revisited Paris, and claimed, through the interest of Madame Tallien, whose portrait he painted, to have made a drawing of Napoleon Bonaparte as first consul. He certainly brought to England sketches and notes, and with the help of Charles Turner and Henry Bernard Chalon very hurriedly painted in his London studio a picture of ‘Napoleon reviewing the Consular Guards in the Court of the Tuileries,’ which he exhibited in Piccadilly in 1801. This picture attracted large crowds on the assumption that it was the first authentic likeness of Napoleon exhibited in England. ‘Peter Porcupine’ (William Cobbett) accused him of being an alien spy and emissary of Napoleon: Masquerier produced the register of his birth at Chelsea.
Masquerier continued to paint and exhibit portraits, which reached in twenty-eight years a total of over four hundred. He also occasionally sent to the Royal Academy a subject picture, such as ‘The Fortune Teller’ (1800), ‘Petrarch and Laura’ (1803), ‘January and May’ (1808). In 1814 he fetched his mother from Paris, and provided for her maintenance in England. It was probably on this journey that he painted a portrait of Emma, Lady Hamilton. In the following year he visited the field of Waterloo and made a painting of ‘La Belle Alliance’. He also drew a portrait of Napoleon's guide, J. B. Coster.
In 1823 he retired from his profession, having amassed a comfortable fortune, and settled at Brighton, where he resided for the remainder of his life. He revisited Paris in 1850, and in 1851 made a tour in Germany with Henry Crabb Robinson. Masquerier still painted occasionally after his retirement; in 1831 he exhibited ‘A Marriage in the Church of St. Germain l'Auxerrois, Paris,’ and in 1838 ‘Buonaparte and Marie Louise viewing the Tomb of Charles the Bold at Bruges.’ He died at Brighton on 13 March 1855. His remaining pictures, sketch-books, &c., became the property of a relative, D. E. Forbes, and were sold by auction at Christie's on 19 January 1878. A number of his sketch-books were in the possession of his friend, Baroness Burdett Coutts.
Works
Among the notabilities painted by him were Miss Mellon and Miss O'Neil (both in the collection of Baroness Burdett Coutts), and Warren Hastings (engraved by S. Freeman for Cadell's ‘Portraits’), besides many of his personal friends and relations. Masquerier painted his own portrait more than once.
Family
He married in 1812 Rachel, widow of Dr. Robert Eden Scott, professor of moral philosophy at Aberdeen, daughter of Duncan Forbes, of Thainstone; she died in 1850, leaving no children.
References
- ↑ Masquerier, John James (1778–1855), painter by Timothy Wilcox, Oxford Dictionary of National Biography
- Attribution
This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: "Masquerier, John James". Dictionary of National Biography. London: Smith, Elder & Co. 1885–1900.
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