A mezzotint after a self-portrait of Sir Godfrey Kneller; almost half length, turned three-quarters to the left. He wears a long curled wig, and a plain cravat. His mantle is grasped at his chest. Oval format. 1st state. Inscribed below: Godfridus Kneller Eques. / Gulielmi & Mariæ Magnæ Britanniæ Regis & Reginæ Pictorum Princeps / Offerebat Humillimus Servus Johannes Smith.

This is the second of three prints which show how Kneller’s public image evolved over the course of his career. It was made nine years after his self-portrait of 1685 (RCIN 657632), soon after he had been knighted (hence ‘Eques’ in the inscription), with the epithet ‘Pictorum Princeps’ (‘Principal Painter’) in larger script than the names of the monarchs. He now shows himself as a pillar of the Establishment, as well dressed and inherently noble as any of his sitters. No corresponding painting is known; it is likely that Kneller provided a design explicitly for Smith to mezzotint (Smith’s preparatory drawing is in the Ashmolean Museum, Oxford). See also RCIN 657637.

Born in Germany, Godfrey Kneller trained in Amsterdam and travelled in Italy before settling in London in 1676. After the deaths of Peter Lely in 1680 and William Wissing in 1687, he established himself as the dominant portrait painter in England for the next 30 years: he was made Principal Painter to William III in 1689, knighted and made a Gentleman of the Privy Chamber in 1692, awarded an honorary doctorate by Oxford in 1695, made a knight of the Holy Roman Empire in 1700, confirmed as Principal Painter to Queen Anne in 1702 and to George I in 1714, and finally created a Baronet in 1715, a rank unsurpassed by an artist in Britain until Frederic Leighton was created Baron Leighton of Stretton almost two centuries later.

Kneller was hugely productive (Stewart 1983 catalogued 875 paintings) and assiduously promoted himself through self-portraiture and the publication of prints after his paintings. He formed close working relationships with Isaac Beckett, who made mezzotints of 28 of his works, and with Beckett’s pupil and successor John Smith, who reproduced 113 of his portraits, publishing the majority himself.

Text adapted from Portrait of the Artist, London, 2016