
George III and Johan Zoffany

Johann Zoffany, Queen Charlotte with her two eldest sons, c.1765 ©
Zoffany (1733/4–1810) trained in Germany and Italy before making his career in England, where he became the most inventive and accomplished painter of theatrical scenes and conversation pieces. George III (1739–1820) employed him in the 1760s and early 1770s to record the happy life of his young family, and to decorate their new home, Buckingham House. Four royal family groups (nos. 19–22) exhibit almost the same range of formal to informal as the Dutch seventeenth-century works shown here (nos. 1–6).
As a painter, Zoffany was more aware of the technical secrets of the Dutch masters than his English contemporaries: his detail is nearly as sharp as theirs, his colours as fresh, his silks as glossy and his interiors as light-filled. Horace Walpole wrote of him: ‘I look upon him as a Dutch painter polished or civilized. He finishes as highly, renders nature as justly, and does not degrade it, as the Flemish school did’.
Johan Joseph Zoffany (Frankfurt 1733-London 1810)
George, Prince of Wales, and Frederick, later Duke of York, at Buckingham House
Johan Joseph Zoffany (Frankfurt 1733-London 1810)
Queen Charlotte (1744-1818) with her Two Eldest Sons
Johan Joseph Zoffany (Frankfurt 1733-London 1810)
The Tribuna of the Uffizi
Johan Joseph Zoffany (Frankfurt 1733-London 1810)
George III (1738-1820), Queen Charlotte (1744-1818) and their Six Eldest Children
Johan Joseph Zoffany (Frankfurt 1733-London 1810)
Queen Charlotte (1744-1818) with members of her family
Johan Joseph Zoffany (Frankfurt 1733-London 1810)
John Cuff
Thomas Gainsborough (1727-88)
Henry, Duke of Cumberland with Anne, Duchess of Cumberland, and Lady Elizabeth Luttrell
John Wootton (c. 1682-1764)