Henry Bone

HENRY BONE (England, 1755-1834).
"Military man on horseback".
Watercolor on paper.
Signed in the lower left corner.
Measurements: 13 x 10 cm; 23 x 19 cm (frame).
Henry Bone was a painter born in Truro, England, specialized in the use of enamel. Before his merits as an artist were known to the public, he was frequently employed by London jewelers to make small enamel designs. In 1800, the beauty of his pieces attracted the attention of the Royal Academy, to which he was admitted as an associate, and subsequently as an academician in 1811. Until 1831 he made many beautiful pieces of much larger size than those he had made in England; among them, his 85 portraits of Elizabeth I of England are the most admired works.
In 1789 he exhibited "A Muse and Cupid," the largest enamel painting ever executed up to that time. In 1800 he was appointed enamel painter to the Prince of Wales; in 1801 he was appointed associate of the Royal Academy (ARA) and enamel painter to George III, and continued to hold the post during the reigns of George IV and William IV. On April 15, 1811, he was elected royal academician (RA), and shortly thereafter produced an even larger enamel (forty by sixteen inches), after Titian's Bacchus and Ariadne. Over 4000 people viewed the work at Bone's house. In the preparation and firing of his large plates, he was assisted by Edward Wedlake Brayley, who was by then a distinguished antiquarian, but had trained as an enameller. Bone's next major works were a series of historical portraits from the time of Elizabeth I, a series of "Distinguished Cavaliers in the Civil War," and a series of portraits of the Russell family. Bone has been called the "Prince of Enamelers." J. Jope Rogers published a large catalog of 1063 works by the Bone family in the Journal of the Royal Institution of Cornwall, No. XXII, March 1880, half of which were occupied by works by Henry Bone.