Antonio Domenico Gabbiani (1652-1726) was a Florentine painter and engraver. He was a pupil of Justus Sustermans, Vincenzo Dandini and Ciro Ferri. In 1763, he moved to Rome for three years of study at the academy for Florentine artists founded by Cosimo de' Medici and directed by Ciro Ferri and Ercole Ferrata. He also made a trip to Venice, where he studied with the portrait artist, Sebastiano Bombelli. He returned to Florence in 1680 and began working independently in 1684. The Medici family were his main patrons and he produced a number of portraits and altarpieces for them, in addition to 'some histories in oil of musicians, singers, hunters, with various animals nearby, at the time of the delightful holiday in Pratolino', according to his biographer, Baldinucci. These four paintings are now in the Pitti palace in Florence. During the 1690s, Gabbiani took a lead role in the fresco decoration of the most important palaces of the nobility in Florence. Amongst his best known works is the Assumption of St Mary Magdalene in the cupola of S Frediano in Cestello. He died in 1726, after a fall from the scaffolding in the Incontri palace in Florence, where he was painting the Banquet of the Gods. A funeral monument was erected for him in the church of S Felice in Piazza. There is a drawing by Gabbiani in the Royal Collection (RCIN 906162).

This miniature is one of the collection of copies of 224 self-portraits by artists in the Uffizi Palace, Florence, that Lord Cowper, the art collector and patron, commissioned Giuseppe Macpherson (1726-1780) to paint. He presented the miniatures to King George III in two batches, in 1773 and 1786. Macpherson followed the original self-portraits quite closely, but copied only the head and shoulders. He inscribed the artists' names on the backs of the miniatures – several differ from those in the modern Uffizi catalogue, notably: Bazzi, Bellini, Campi, Annibale Carracci, Gabbiani, Masaccio, Metsys, Moroni, Pencz, Licinio, Schiavone and Spada. None of the miniatures is signed, apart from Macpherson's own self-portrait, which is inscribed: Giuseppe Macpherson / Autore della serie (Giuseppe Macpherson / Author of the series).Macpherson was born in Florence, the son of Donald Macpherson, a footman in the service of Alexander, 2nd Duke of Gordon. He was a pupil of Pompeo Batoni and painted miniatures and enamel portraits in Italy, France and Germany, finally settling in Florence. A James Macpherson is recorded in London and Paris in 1754 but it is not certain that this is the same person. He was described in 1776 as having a special talent for painting on enamel and as being 'almost the only painter in Europe who possesses this art to perfection'. He had a distinguished client list which included some of the crowned heads and dignitaries of Europe. In 1778, he was invited to add his own self-portrait to the famous painters in the grand duke's collection as it 'would do honour to Florence to enrich the collection with a work which shows that we still have some men of true merit' according to Giuseppe Pelli, director of the Uffizi at the time.