JAMES NORTHCOTE R.A. | A YOUNG WOMAN AND GIRL OFFERING CHARITY TO A KNEELING BEGGAR BOY WITH A MONKEY ON HIS SHOULDER

Commissioned by Mr Smith for 30 guineas in 1784;

Anonymous sale, London, Christie's, 5 June 1953, lot 96, for £75 to Peterson;

In the collection of the present owner for at least a decade.

S. Gwynn, Memorials of an Eighteenth Century Painter (James Northcote), London 1898, p. 271, cat. no. 185;

J. Simon, 'The account book of James Northcote', in The Walpole Society, vol. LVIII, 1995-96, p. 52, no. 200;

M. Postle, Angels and Urchins, the Fancy Picture in 18th Century British Art, exh. cat., Kenwood House 1998, pp. 89-90.

Engraved

William Ward, 1787 (with title A young lady encouraging the low comedian).¹

Northcote's Account book records a payment for 30 guineas for this picture in 1785 from 'Mr Smith'. The same collector also bought 'Connubial Happiness' by the same artist shortly afterwards. It seems likely that the buyer was one of the family of bankers from Nottingham, as only a few years earlier, in 1783, Northcote had painted a portrait of Elizabeth Smith, widow of Abel Smith of Nottingham, with her daughter. The present picture could have been commissioned by Robert or Samuel Smith, two of Abel Smith's brothers and both successful bankers, or his father Abel Smith, head of the banking family. 

In his catalogue entry for the print of this subject in the Angels and Urchins exhibition, Dr. Martin Postle points out that the boy is recognisable as Jack Hill, the same model who often sat for Gainsborough in the mid 1780s - he appears in A Shepherd and Beggar Boys.² Gainsborough had seen him begging near his house in St. James' Street. The inspiration for the picture comes from Murillo's paintings of street urchins, which were very popular in England in the 18th century. It is particularly close to Murillo's Three Boys (Dulwich Art Gallery).³

¹ https://www.britishmuseum.org/collection/object/P_1953-0214-61

² https://www.npg.org.uk/collections/search/portrait/mw68882/The-Shepherd-Boy; https://artuk.org/discover/artworks/two-shepherd-boys-with-dogs-fighting-191714

³ https://www.dulwichpicturegallery.org.uk/explore-the-collection/201-250/three-boys/