Levin August, Count Bennigsen (1745-1826) c.1810-15
Oil on copper | 18.9 x 16.1 cm (support, canvas/panel/stretcher external) | RCIN 400617
-
Stroehling’s work in the Royal Collection allows us to trace a rare example of continuity between the masters of the Dutch Golden Age and those of the early nineteenth century. Stroehling was brought up in Dusseldorf where a magnificent collection of the polished, classicising and elegant works (often on copper) by artists such as Adriaen van der Werff (1659-1722) had been formed by Johann Wilhelm II, Elector Palatine (1658-1716). Stroehling worked all over Europe but spend much of the first two decades of the nineteenth century in London; between 1810 and 1820 he was even styled ‘Historical Painter to the Prince of Wales’. Stroehling’s work elsewhere tended to be life-sized portraiture, but the Royal Collection has an important group of small-scale portraits on copper, executed with fine detail and a glossy finish; Joseph Farington perceptively referred to them as ‘painted in a Vanderwerfe manner’. Stroehling’s price for these ‘Cabinet Pictures’ was 200 guineas each, an impressive sum in the period even for a life-sized work.
Count Benningsen was a Hanoverian who served with great distinction in the Russian army during the Napoleonic Wars. He is here shown wearing the uniform of the Russian Chevalier Garde, with the ribbon and star of the Order of St Andrew of Russia and with the badges of St George of Russia and St John of Malta. The strict profile, set within a painted oval, suggests that this portrait might be part of a series of distinguished warriors to be engraved, made into medals, reliefs or some other decorative form.Provenance
First recorded at Kew Palace in 1860
-
Creator(s)
(nationality) -
Medium and techniques
Oil on copper
Measurements
18.9 x 16.1 cm (support, canvas/panel/stretcher external)
31.3 x 28.8 x 7.2 cm (frame, external)
Category
Object type(s)
Other number(s)
Alternative title(s)
Levin Augustus, Baron Benningsen (1745-1826), previously called