St. Martin's Lane Academy
Encyclopedia
The St. Martin's Lane Academy, which was the precursor of the Royal Academy
, was organized in 1735 by William Hogarth
, from the circle of artists and designers who gathered at Slaughter's Coffee House at the upper end of St. Martin's Lane
, London
. The artistic set that introduced the Rococo
style to England was centered on "Old Slaughter's" and the drawing-classes at the St. Martin's Lane Academy were inextricably linked in the dissemination of new artistic ideas in England in the reigns of George II
and George III.
In Britain in the early eighteenth century there was no organised public official patronage of the arts, aside from commissions for specific projects. There was no established body to compare with the Académie royale de peinture et de sculpture that Colbert
had established in France, and no public exhibition of recent paintings such as the Paris salon
s, held every other year. The closest approximation to an academic life-drawing class was established by Sir Godfrey Kneller
in 1711, and assumed by Sir James Thornhill
, his official successor, who conducted life-drawing classes from a room he added to his own house in James Street, Covent Garden, from 1724 until his death in May 1734, but with small success in finding subscribers, his son-in-law William Hogarth
recalled; Hogarth attributed its failure in some measure to the rival drawing-academy set up by John Vanderbank
and Louis Cheron
which split off from Kneller's in 1718. It was Hogarth who established the St. Martin's Lane Academy in 1735, removing apparatus from Thornhill's studio, and Hogarth remained its central figure. Hogarth wrote an account of its formation about 1760, in which he takes credit for the sound democratic principle that all should contribute an equal sum to the Academy's expenses and have an equal vote, "attributing the failure of the previous academies to the leading members having assumed a superiority which their fellow-students could not brook." Thus the Academy abandoned hierarchic seventeenth-century precedents and was formed on the basis of a club
.
The painters were themselves reacting against the Italianate Late Baroque manner exemplified by Thornhill himself, and the designers were finding alternatives to the cool neo-Palladian classicism being espoused in the 1730s by Lord Burlington and William Kent
; the rococo artists found patrons, as Mark Girouard
first noted, in the circle that formed around Frederick, Prince of Wales
in Leicester Square.
The membership of the academy formed from an informal, club-like circle that was in the habit of meeting at Old Slaughter's Coffee House, which had been at 74 and 75, St. Martin's Lane since 1692, when the neighbourhood was still distinctly suburban. It was "Old" Slaughter's Coffee House after 1742, when a new Slaughter's Coffee House opened, at no. 82 (the present site of Westminster County Court).
Among the members of the St. Martin's Lane Academy were Hubert Gravelot, engraver and book illustrator, François Roubiliac
, a French sculptor established in London, Francis Hayman
and his pupil, the very young Thomas Gainsborough
who was employed by Gravelot, George Michael Moser
, a Swiss-born artist and enameller, later first Keeper of the Royal Academy collections, Richard Yeo
, medallist, and Isaac Ware
, architects. Desmond Fitz-Gerald notes that an asterisk in the list of subscribers to Joshua Kirby, Dr Brook Taylor's Method of Perspective Made Easy (London 1754) identifies members of the St. Martin's Lane Academy; Fitz-Gerald notes as further members the architect James Paine; Charles, son of Henry Cheere, sculptor; and Johann Sebastian Müller, an engraver of Chippendale's Director. An unexpected member of the circle was James Stuart
, trained as a painter but familiar as one of the earliest practitioners of Neoclassicism
in Europe; that later phase was far in the future when he moved in the Academy's milieu, introduced by the French engravers Louis
and Joseph Goupy
, both of whom were members.
The premises of the Academy were a large room in Peter's Court, entered from the Lane through a low vaulted passageway
George Vertue
noted early in 1745 "The academy for the study of painting & other artists [sic] is carryd on and conducted by several, Ellis
, Hayman, Gravelot, Wills— &c..."" Of these four named by Vertue, the most obscure is James Wills (working c. 1740–1777), later the Rev. James Wills. In 1754 he made a translation of du Fresnoy
's stilted and old-fashioned Latin poem on the art of painting, De arte graphica, which did not meet a successful reception. but which apparently identifies Wills as the "Fresnoy" who published bitterly sarcastic invective at Sir Joshua Reynolds
and artists like Zoffany who had left the Society of Artists to join the newly-founded Royal Academy. His "conversation piece" The Andrews Family (signed "J. Wills pinxit" and dated 1749) is at the Fitzwilliam Museum
. Edward Edwards' continuation of Walpole's Anecdotes of Painters (1808:55) notes that Wills had painted some portraits and historical subjects, "but not meeting much success in his profession he quit it, and having received a liberal education, took orders. He was for some years curate at Cannons, Middlesex
, where the prominent cabinet-maker of St. Martin's Lane William Hallett had built a residence on part of the foundations of the great demolished house. In 1772 the Rev. James Wills was appointed to the living at Canons by Hallett's grandson, the subject, with his wife, of Gainsborough's The Morning Walk (1787).
Not all the artists in St. Martin's Lane were members of the Academy. Matthew Lock, the draughtsman and engraver who engraved most of the designs for Chippendale's Director, advertised in 1748 that he was offering evening drawing-classes for tradesmen and students in his premises "Facing Old Slaughter's Coffee House". and Thomas Chippendale
, the most famous maker of English rococo furniture, seem never to have joined.
Other French Protestant emigrés were drawn to the mix of English and foreigners at Slaughter's. Abraham de Moivre
, friend of Newton and Halley, eked out a meagre existence as a tutor, spending evening hours at Slaughter's. at the time chiefly interesting to gamblers seeking to maximize their odds rather than to statisticians. Other intellectuals were drawn to the atmosphere of Slaughter's: Joseph Priestly met in a virtual "Slaughter's Club" with Josiah Wedgwood
, Captain Cook and Sir Joseph Banks
.
The presence of several outstanding cabinetmakers in St. Martin's Lane was influential in translating Rococo designs into furnishings. In December 1753, directly across from Old Slaughter's Thomas Chippendale
took a long lease on three houses that served as his premises for the rest of his career. A chance remark establishes that John Linnell attended life-classes at the St. Martin's Lane Academy, and William Hallett also had workshops in the Lane.
In the 1760s Old Slaughter's Coffee House was the place where the Italian painter Antonio Zucchi
, brought to London by Robert Adam
, formed a friendship with the literary intellectual Jean-Paul Marat
, "a man of extensive classical learning who continually proposed subjects which he had selected for Zucchi to design", the painter Joseph Farington
noted in his diary, after Marat's subsequent revolutionary career had run its course; Marat came to Zucchi's house "in the most familiar manner, a knife and fork laid for him every day."
At a later date it was "over a Neck of Veal and Potatoes, at the Old Slaughter Coffee House", that the liberal scientific Club of Honest Whigs, centered on the figure of Benjamin Franklin
was formed.
The artistic circle meeting at Old Slaughter's Coffee House was revived from its obscurity in a series of articles by Mark Girouard.
Royal Academy
The Royal Academy of Arts is an art institution based in Burlington House on Piccadilly, London. The Royal Academy of Arts has a unique position in being an independent, privately funded institution led by eminent artists and architects whose purpose is to promote the creation, enjoyment and...
, was organized in 1735 by William Hogarth
William Hogarth
William Hogarth was an English painter, printmaker, pictorial satirist, social critic and editorial cartoonist who has been credited with pioneering western sequential art. His work ranged from realistic portraiture to comic strip-like series of pictures called "modern moral subjects"...
, from the circle of artists and designers who gathered at Slaughter's Coffee House at the upper end of St. Martin's Lane
St. Martin's Lane
St. Martin's Lane is a street on the edge of Covent Garden in Central London, which runs from the church of St. Martin-in-the-Fields, after which it is named, near Trafalgar Square northwards to Long Acre.A narrow street with relatively little traffic, St...
, London
London
London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...
. The artistic set that introduced the Rococo
Rococo
Rococo , also referred to as "Late Baroque", is an 18th-century style which developed as Baroque artists gave up their symmetry and became increasingly ornate, florid, and playful...
style to England was centered on "Old Slaughter's" and the drawing-classes at the St. Martin's Lane Academy were inextricably linked in the dissemination of new artistic ideas in England in the reigns of George II
George II of Great Britain
George II was King of Great Britain and Ireland, Duke of Brunswick-Lüneburg and Archtreasurer and Prince-elector of the Holy Roman Empire from 11 June 1727 until his death.George was the last British monarch born outside Great Britain. He was born and brought up in Northern Germany...
and George III.
In Britain in the early eighteenth century there was no organised public official patronage of the arts, aside from commissions for specific projects. There was no established body to compare with the Académie royale de peinture et de sculpture that Colbert
Jean-Baptiste Colbert
Jean-Baptiste Colbert was a French politician who served as the Minister of Finances of France from 1665 to 1683 under the rule of King Louis XIV. His relentless hard work and thrift made him an esteemed minister. He achieved a reputation for his work of improving the state of French manufacturing...
had established in France, and no public exhibition of recent paintings such as the Paris salon
Paris Salon
The Salon , or rarely Paris Salon , beginning in 1725 was the official art exhibition of the Académie des Beaux-Arts in Paris, France. Between 1748–1890 it was the greatest annual or biannual art event in the Western world...
s, held every other year. The closest approximation to an academic life-drawing class was established by Sir Godfrey Kneller
Godfrey Kneller
Sir Godfrey Kneller, 1st Baronet was the leading portrait painter in England during the late 17th and early 18th centuries, and was court painter to British monarchs from Charles II to George I...
in 1711, and assumed by Sir James Thornhill
James Thornhill
Sir James Thornhill was an English painter of historical subjects, in the Italian baroque tradition.-Life:...
, his official successor, who conducted life-drawing classes from a room he added to his own house in James Street, Covent Garden, from 1724 until his death in May 1734, but with small success in finding subscribers, his son-in-law William Hogarth
William Hogarth
William Hogarth was an English painter, printmaker, pictorial satirist, social critic and editorial cartoonist who has been credited with pioneering western sequential art. His work ranged from realistic portraiture to comic strip-like series of pictures called "modern moral subjects"...
recalled; Hogarth attributed its failure in some measure to the rival drawing-academy set up by John Vanderbank
John Vanderbank
John Vanderbank was an English portrait painter and book illustrator, who enjoyed a high reputation for a short while during the reign of King George I, but who died relatively young due to an intemperate and extravagant lifestyle.-Life:Vanderbank was born in London, the eldest son of John...
and Louis Cheron
Louis Chéron
Louis Chéron was a French painter, illustrator and art tutor.-Life:Born into a French Protestant family of artists . He trained under his father then at the Académie Royale de Peinture et de Sculpture...
which split off from Kneller's in 1718. It was Hogarth who established the St. Martin's Lane Academy in 1735, removing apparatus from Thornhill's studio, and Hogarth remained its central figure. Hogarth wrote an account of its formation about 1760, in which he takes credit for the sound democratic principle that all should contribute an equal sum to the Academy's expenses and have an equal vote, "attributing the failure of the previous academies to the leading members having assumed a superiority which their fellow-students could not brook." Thus the Academy abandoned hierarchic seventeenth-century precedents and was formed on the basis of a club
Club
A club is an association of two or more people united by a common interest or goal. A service club, for example, exists for voluntary or charitable activities; there are clubs devoted to hobbies and sports, social activities clubs, political and religious clubs, and so forth.- History...
.
The painters were themselves reacting against the Italianate Late Baroque manner exemplified by Thornhill himself, and the designers were finding alternatives to the cool neo-Palladian classicism being espoused in the 1730s by Lord Burlington and William Kent
William Kent
William Kent , born in Bridlington, Yorkshire, was an eminent English architect, landscape architect and furniture designer of the early 18th century.He was baptised as William Cant.-Education:...
; the rococo artists found patrons, as Mark Girouard
Mark Girouard
Dr Mark Girouard MA, PhD, DipArch, FSA is a British architectural writer, an authority on the country house, leading architectural historian, and biographer of James Stirling.- Family life :...
first noted, in the circle that formed around Frederick, Prince of Wales
Frederick, Prince of Wales
Frederick, Prince of Wales was a member of the House of Hanover and therefore of the Hanoverian and later British Royal Family, the eldest son of George II and father of George III, as well as the great-grandfather of Queen Victoria...
in Leicester Square.
The membership of the academy formed from an informal, club-like circle that was in the habit of meeting at Old Slaughter's Coffee House, which had been at 74 and 75, St. Martin's Lane since 1692, when the neighbourhood was still distinctly suburban. It was "Old" Slaughter's Coffee House after 1742, when a new Slaughter's Coffee House opened, at no. 82 (the present site of Westminster County Court).
Among the members of the St. Martin's Lane Academy were Hubert Gravelot, engraver and book illustrator, François Roubiliac
Louis-François Roubiliac
Louis-François Roubiliac was a French sculptor who worked in England, one of the four most prominent sculptors in London working in the rococo style, "probably the most accomplished sculptor ever to work in England", according to Margaret Whinney.-Works:Roubiliac was largely employed for portrait...
, a French sculptor established in London, Francis Hayman
Francis Hayman
Francis Hayman was an English painter and illustrator who became one of the founding members of the Royal Academy in 1768 and later its first librarian....
and his pupil, the very young Thomas Gainsborough
Thomas Gainsborough
Thomas Gainsborough was an English portrait and landscape painter.-Suffolk:Thomas Gainsborough was born in Sudbury, Suffolk. He was the youngest son of John Gainsborough, a weaver and maker of woolen goods. At the age of thirteen he impressed his father with his penciling skills so that he let...
who was employed by Gravelot, George Michael Moser
George Michael Moser
George Michael Moser was a renowned artist and enameller of the 18th century, father of celebrated floral painter Mary Moser, and, with his daughter, among the founder members of the Royal Academy in 1768.-Biography:...
, a Swiss-born artist and enameller, later first Keeper of the Royal Academy collections, Richard Yeo
Richard Yeo
Richard Yeo was a British medalist and Chief Engraver at the Royal Mint, in which capacity he supplied patterns for the Guinea a five guinea coins of George III. He was a founding member of the Royal Academy of Art, and appears in the group portrait by John Zoffany.-External links:...
, medallist, and Isaac Ware
Isaac Ware
Isaac Ware was an English architect and translator of Italian Renaissance architect Andrea Palladio.He was apprenticed to Thomas Ripley, 1 August 1721, and followed him in positions in the Office of Works, but his mentor in design was Lord Burlington.Ware was a member of the St...
, architects. Desmond Fitz-Gerald notes that an asterisk in the list of subscribers to Joshua Kirby, Dr Brook Taylor's Method of Perspective Made Easy (London 1754) identifies members of the St. Martin's Lane Academy; Fitz-Gerald notes as further members the architect James Paine; Charles, son of Henry Cheere, sculptor; and Johann Sebastian Müller, an engraver of Chippendale's Director. An unexpected member of the circle was James Stuart
James Stuart
James Stuart may refer to:*King James I of England, James VI of Scotland *King James II of England, James VII of Scotland *James Francis Edward Stuart , "the Old Pretender", claimant to the thrones of England and Scotland...
, trained as a painter but familiar as one of the earliest practitioners of Neoclassicism
Neoclassicism
Neoclassicism is the name given to Western movements in the decorative and visual arts, literature, theatre, music, and architecture that draw inspiration from the "classical" art and culture of Ancient Greece or Ancient Rome...
in Europe; that later phase was far in the future when he moved in the Academy's milieu, introduced by the French engravers Louis
Louis Goupy
Louis or Lewis Goupy was a French painter, portraitist and miniaturist, who studied under Bernard Lens and was active in London by 1710 alongside his brother Charles Goupy. From 1710 to 1733 he lived in King Street, Covent Garden...
and Joseph Goupy
Joseph Goupy
Joseph Goupy was a French engraver, painter, set designer and watercolourist. One of his patrons was Frederick, Prince of Wales, and with his brother Francis, he was a member of the St Martin's Lane Academy, studying under his uncle Louis Goupy...
, both of whom were members.
The premises of the Academy were a large room in Peter's Court, entered from the Lane through a low vaulted passageway
George Vertue
George Vertue
George Vertue was an English engraver and antiquary, whose notebooks on British art of the first half of the 18th century are a valuable source for the period.-Life:...
noted early in 1745 "The academy for the study of painting & other artists [sic] is carryd on and conducted by several, Ellis
John Ellys
-Life:Ellys was born in March 1701. When about fifteen years old, he was placed for instruction under Sir James Thornhill, with whom he did not stay long, and for a short time under Johann Rudolph Schmutz. He subsequently became an imitator of John Vanderbank and was a student with William Hogarth...
, Hayman, Gravelot, Wills— &c..."" Of these four named by Vertue, the most obscure is James Wills (working c. 1740–1777), later the Rev. James Wills. In 1754 he made a translation of du Fresnoy
Charles Alphonse du Fresnoy
Charles Alphonse du Fresnoy , French painter and writer on his art, was born in Paris, son of an apothecary.He was destined for the medical profession, and well educated in Latin and Greek; but, having a natural propensity for the fine arts, he would not apply to his intended vocation, and was...
's stilted and old-fashioned Latin poem on the art of painting, De arte graphica, which did not meet a successful reception. but which apparently identifies Wills as the "Fresnoy" who published bitterly sarcastic invective at Sir Joshua Reynolds
Joshua Reynolds
Sir Joshua Reynolds RA FRS FRSA was an influential 18th-century English painter, specialising in portraits and promoting the "Grand Style" in painting which depended on idealization of the imperfect. He was one of the founders and first President of the Royal Academy...
and artists like Zoffany who had left the Society of Artists to join the newly-founded Royal Academy. His "conversation piece" The Andrews Family (signed "J. Wills pinxit" and dated 1749) is at the Fitzwilliam Museum
Fitzwilliam Museum
The Fitzwilliam Museum is the art and antiquities museum of the University of Cambridge, located on Trumpington Street opposite Fitzwilliam Street in central Cambridge, England. It receives around 300,000 visitors annually. Admission is free....
. Edward Edwards' continuation of Walpole's Anecdotes of Painters (1808:55) notes that Wills had painted some portraits and historical subjects, "but not meeting much success in his profession he quit it, and having received a liberal education, took orders. He was for some years curate at Cannons, Middlesex
Cannons (house)
Cannons was a stately home in Little Stanmore, Middlesex built for James Brydges, 1st Duke of Chandos between 1713 and 1724 at a cost of £200,000 but which in 1747 was razed and its contents dispersed....
, where the prominent cabinet-maker of St. Martin's Lane William Hallett had built a residence on part of the foundations of the great demolished house. In 1772 the Rev. James Wills was appointed to the living at Canons by Hallett's grandson, the subject, with his wife, of Gainsborough's The Morning Walk (1787).
Not all the artists in St. Martin's Lane were members of the Academy. Matthew Lock, the draughtsman and engraver who engraved most of the designs for Chippendale's Director, advertised in 1748 that he was offering evening drawing-classes for tradesmen and students in his premises "Facing Old Slaughter's Coffee House". and Thomas Chippendale
Thomas Chippendale
Thomas Chippendale was a London cabinet-maker and furniture designer in the mid-Georgian, English Rococo, and Neoclassical styles. In 1754 he published a book of his designs, titled The Gentleman and Cabinet Maker's Director...
, the most famous maker of English rococo furniture, seem never to have joined.
Other French Protestant emigrés were drawn to the mix of English and foreigners at Slaughter's. Abraham de Moivre
Abraham de Moivre
Abraham de Moivre was a French mathematician famous for de Moivre's formula, which links complex numbers and trigonometry, and for his work on the normal distribution and probability theory. He was a friend of Isaac Newton, Edmund Halley, and James Stirling...
, friend of Newton and Halley, eked out a meagre existence as a tutor, spending evening hours at Slaughter's. at the time chiefly interesting to gamblers seeking to maximize their odds rather than to statisticians. Other intellectuals were drawn to the atmosphere of Slaughter's: Joseph Priestly met in a virtual "Slaughter's Club" with Josiah Wedgwood
Josiah Wedgwood
Josiah Wedgwood was an English potter, founder of the Wedgwood company, credited with the industrialization of the manufacture of pottery. A prominent abolitionist, Wedgwood is remembered for his "Am I Not A Man And A Brother?" anti-slavery medallion. He was a member of the Darwin–Wedgwood family...
, Captain Cook and Sir Joseph Banks
Joseph Banks
Sir Joseph Banks, 1st Baronet, GCB, PRS was an English naturalist, botanist and patron of the natural sciences. He took part in Captain James Cook's first great voyage . Banks is credited with the introduction to the Western world of eucalyptus, acacia, mimosa and the genus named after him,...
.
The presence of several outstanding cabinetmakers in St. Martin's Lane was influential in translating Rococo designs into furnishings. In December 1753, directly across from Old Slaughter's Thomas Chippendale
Thomas Chippendale
Thomas Chippendale was a London cabinet-maker and furniture designer in the mid-Georgian, English Rococo, and Neoclassical styles. In 1754 he published a book of his designs, titled The Gentleman and Cabinet Maker's Director...
took a long lease on three houses that served as his premises for the rest of his career. A chance remark establishes that John Linnell attended life-classes at the St. Martin's Lane Academy, and William Hallett also had workshops in the Lane.
In the 1760s Old Slaughter's Coffee House was the place where the Italian painter Antonio Zucchi
Antonio Zucchi
Antonio Zucchi was an Italian painter of the Neoclassic period. Born in Venice and died in Rome. He married the painter Angelica Kauffmann, who late in life, moved with him to Rome. He produced a number of etchings of capriccio and veduta of classical buildings or ruins. He worked with Robert Adam...
, brought to London by Robert Adam
Robert Adam
Robert Adam was a Scottish neoclassical architect, interior designer and furniture designer. He was the son of William Adam , Scotland's foremost architect of the time, and trained under him...
, formed a friendship with the literary intellectual Jean-Paul Marat
Jean-Paul Marat
Jean-Paul Marat , born in the Principality of Neuchâtel, was a physician, political theorist, and scientist best known for his career in France as a radical journalist and politician during the French Revolution...
, "a man of extensive classical learning who continually proposed subjects which he had selected for Zucchi to design", the painter Joseph Farington
Joseph Farington
Joseph Farington was an 18th-century English landscape painter and diarist.-Life and work:Born in Leigh, Lancashire, Farington was the second of seven sons of William Farington and Esther Gilbody. His father was the rector of Warrington and vicar of Leigh...
noted in his diary, after Marat's subsequent revolutionary career had run its course; Marat came to Zucchi's house "in the most familiar manner, a knife and fork laid for him every day."
At a later date it was "over a Neck of Veal and Potatoes, at the Old Slaughter Coffee House", that the liberal scientific Club of Honest Whigs, centered on the figure of Benjamin Franklin
Benjamin Franklin
Dr. Benjamin Franklin was one of the Founding Fathers of the United States. A noted polymath, Franklin was a leading author, printer, political theorist, politician, postmaster, scientist, musician, inventor, satirist, civic activist, statesman, and diplomat...
was formed.
The artistic circle meeting at Old Slaughter's Coffee House was revived from its obscurity in a series of articles by Mark Girouard.