Sir Thomas Lawrence
NG6692 
Portrait of Charles William Lambton (‘The Red Boy’)

Mary McMahon, with technical contributions by Marta Melchiorre, Paul Ackroyd, David Peggie and Rachel Billinge, 2024

Extracted from:
The National Gallery; with entries by Emma Capron, Dillian Gordon, Sarah Herring, Mary McMahon, Letizia Treves and Francesca Whitlum‐Cooper; with technical contributions by Paul Ackroyd, Rachel Beard, Rachel Billinge, Lynne Harrison, Catherine Higgitt, Helen Howard, Larry Keith, Marta Melchiorre, Britta New, David Peggie, Marika Spring and Hayley Tomlinson, Online Entries (London: The National Gallery, 2024).

1825

Oil on canvas, 140.5 × 110.6 cm

Provenance

Commissioned by John George Lambton (1792–1840), 1st Earl of Durham; by family descent to Edward Lambton, 7th Earl of Durham, who offered the painting through Christie’s; bought with the support of the American Friends of the National Gallery, the Estate of Miss Gillian Cleaver, Art Fund (with a contribution from the Wolfson Foundation), The Al Thani Collection Foundation, The Manny and Brigitta Davidson Charitable Foundation and through private appeal, 2021.

Exhibitions

London RA 1825 (288); Paris 1827 (ex‐catalogue); London 1830 (49); Manchester 1857 (221); London 1868 (242); Newcastle 1887 (715); London Grafton Galleries 1895 (116); London RA 1895 (6); London RA 1904 (52); Wembley 1924–5 (4); Newcastle 1929 (267); London 1931 (6); Amsterdam 1936 (73); London RA 1951–2 (178); Manchester 1957 (224); London RA 1968–9 (182); London 1979–80 (42); Berkeley, Memphis and Omaha 1995–6 (30); London, Minneapolis and New York 2003–4 (50); London and New Haven 2010–11 (45).

Literature

Williams 1831, vol. 2, pp. 363–7; Gower 1900, p. 141; Reid 1906, p. 184; Armstrong 1913, p. 144; Whitley 1930, p. 88; Garlick 1954, p. 120; Levey 1979, p. 75; Garlick 1989, p. 219, no. 463; pl. 88 (colour); Noon 2003; Levey 2005, pp. 254–8; Albinson, Funnell and Peltz 2010, pp. 250–2, no. 45.

Engravings and Prints

(1) ‘Master Lambton’, Samuel Cousins, ‘Published for the Proprietor, Sir T. Lawrence P.R.A. Jan.y 1827’, mezzotint, 46.6 × 35.3 cm; published later that year by ‘Colnaghi Son & Co. Printsellers to His Majesty March 26th 1827’, mezzotint, 46.6 × 35.5 cm.

(2) ‘Master Lambton’, Rudolph Huber, after Sir Thomas Lawrence, published 1837, chromolithograph, plate from album, 16.6 × 12.7 cm (head and shoulders in oval), 35.4 × 26 cm (sheet).

(3) John Quartley, after Sir Thomas Lawrence, 1835–67, wood engraving, proof illustration to an unidentified publication., 15.7 × 12.1 cm.

(4) ‘Master Lambton, the son of J.G. Lambton, Esq. M.P.’, Etienne Bocourt and Charles Maurand, after Sir Thomas Lawrence, illustration from L’Art, vols 1–7, 1875–6, wood engraving, 24.7 × 18.7 cm.

(5) ‘Master Lambton, son of Lord Durham’, after S. Cousins, after Sir Thomas Lawrence, 1899, photogravure, illustration to Samuel Rawson Gardiner’s Oliver Cromwell, London 1899, 25.9 × 20.3 cm.

(6) Samuel Arlent Edwards, after Sir Thomas Lawrence, 1900–23, mezzotint on chine collé, 20 × 14.8 cm.

Technical Notes

Support

The painting is executed on a single piece of commercially prepared twill weave canvas, characteristic of Lawrence’s works at this time.¹ The dimensions of the stretcher, as measured during the latest conservation treatment (142.7 × 112 cm), indicate that the canvas might have been approximately the same dimensions as a bishop’s half‐length.²

Materials and Technique

The white ground was applied by the canvas supplier in two layers, which both consist of calcium carbonate (probably in the form of natural chalk, seen to contain occasional particles of siliceous minerals), with the inclusion of a small amount of lead white in the uppermost application.³ On top of the ground there is an additional light brown priming, consisting of a brown humic earth (of the type sold under the names of Vandyke brown or Cologne earth),⁴ yellow ochre, some lead white, small amounts of light red ochre,⁵ and bone black.⁶ This was probably applied by Lawrence himself, and perhaps similar in colour to the priming visible in his unfinished self portrait, now in the Royal Academy of Arts, London (fig. 1).

According to contemporary historical accounts, Lawrence’s standard portraiture practice on the first day ‘was to begin by making a drawing of the head full size on canvass [sic]; carefully tracing dimensions and expression’. He would continue to paint the head at the following sitting.⁷ This is probably what he did for this portrait too,⁸ although no drawing lines for the head can be seen in the infrared reflectogram, either because they were made in a material not visible with infrared reflectography or because the upper paint layers were not adequately penetrated. Infrared reflectography does, however, show a few sketchy lines defining the main position of the boy’s body (such as the horizontal line defining the position of his right leg, underneath the left one), his clothes and possibly some basic outlines for edges of rocks. These lines are not always precisely followed at the paint stage (figs 2, 3).

The lead X‐ray fluorescence (XRF) map shows an area around Charles Lambton’s head, probably rich in lead white and associated with a first, approximate laying‐in layer. After painting at least part of the head, Lawrence covered what was still exposed of this light‐coloured layer with a dark paint (see fig. 2), which he then disguised under further brown paint applications blending the area with the surrounding rocks. These final brown layers, which have slightly different hues and composition, were applied vigorously, sometimes pushing the paint with the point of a stiff brush, as visible just to the right of the boy’s head (figs 4, 5). Some brown paint (containing ochreous pigments) was used to alter the shape of the white shirt over the boy’s right shoulder (figs 6, 7). This, and a minor shift in the position of his right foot, initially planned in a slightly higher position (see fig. 2), are the few minor revisions (or rather adjustments) made while painting.

The most significant change involves the choice of colour for the clothes. Historical accounts referring to the fact that Lawrence had initially painted the boy’s clothing in yellow (see Subject) were backed up by evidence gathered during the recent technical examination. XRF scanning and analysis of paint cross‐sections revealed a thin yellow paint layer, containing chrome yellow, beneath the boy’s red clothes (figs 8, 9). In 1825 chrome yellow was a relatively new pigment,⁹ although not completely unknown to other British artists working around that time, such as Joseph Mallord William Turner and John Constable.¹⁰ Lawrence was interested in new pigments, but cautious about their stability, and had a collaboration with the chemist and pigment manufacturer George Field to examine and test them. Some notes in Field’s journals, dated around 1815, record the analysis of two yellow samples received from Lawrence that both proved to be chrome yellow.¹¹ The yellow paint under the boy’s clothes is so thin and even that it is either a very initial laying‐in application, or what was left after most of the yellow paint was removed while still wet. Both possibilities suggest that the decision to change the colour was taken early in the process of creating the painting.

The boy’s iconic red velvet skeleton suit and jacket are rendered with a complex build‐up of paint: first a semi‐opaque and relatively thick red (containing different red lakes, vermilion and red ochre), followed by a variable sequence of layers used to model the folds. In the mid‐tones and shadow areas, the uppermost paint applications have the quality of glaze‐like translucent layers (fig. 10),¹² found to contain pine resin in addition to heat‐bodied linseed oil, otherwise identified as the main paint binding medium.¹³ Two red lake pigments were identified in the paint for the clothes: both are precipitated on a similar aluminium‐rich substrate but derived from different dyestuffs, one extracted from the cochineal insect (probably the Mexican Dactylopius coccus Costa), the other from madder (probably Rubia tinctorum L.).¹⁴ The substrate of a third darker red‐brown lake, seen in the uppermost glaze‐like toning layers, contains a little copper in addition to aluminium, which would have an influence on the pigment’s hue, as found in certain madder‐based lakes used by Turner around the same time.¹⁵ An additional lac‐based lake (Kerria lacca) was identified in the flower on the right.¹⁶ This varied selection of lake pigments hints again at Lawrence’s working relationship with Field, known for his interest in the manufacture of madder.

The few touches of green in the landscape derive from a combination of yellows and blues, either mixed or applied in subsequent layers, as seen in the lighter leaves at top right, rendered with translucent blue glazes over a bright yellow (likely to be chrome yellow; fig. 11).¹⁷ The blue glazes contain Prussian blue and natural ultramarine, which were also identified in the nocturnal sky. Here, the blue paint is underlaid with a cool brownish‐grey tonal underpaint containing bone black, lead white and a humic brown earth. The combination of these brownish‐grey and blue layers appears particularly dark in the infrared reflectogram, showing that Lawrence covered part of the sky he had originally planned by extending the rocks at top left (see fig. 2).

In painting most of the rocky backdrop, Lawrence used the light brown priming as an opaque base colour for subsequent multiple paint layers that, despite differing in thickness and hue, are all somewhat translucent. The technical images are particularly useful for appreciating the quality of these passages, gradually added around the boy’s figure, in fluid, broad and often overlapping brushstrokes (see figs 2, 7). They include a range of brown, yellow and red tints, modulated with a varied array of lakes (derived from yellow, brown‐yellow and red dyestuffs) and inorganic pigments (bone black, umber and brown humic earths, vermilion, red and yellow ochres, chrome yellow, Naples yellow and the less common Patent yellow). Similar to what was seen in the reds of the boy’s clothes, there are indications of pine resin having been included in the most translucent paint applications of the rocks, rich in binding medium (figs 12, 13). The lighter tones of those areas lit by the moon are rendered with more opaque paint, rich in lead white.

Condition of the Painting/Conservation History

There are no records of the painting’s conservation history prior to its acquisition. The painting is in remarkably good condition apart from a small L‐shaped tear above the sitter’s head to the right. This was repaired with a full lining treatment that appears to date from the late nineteenth or early twentieth century. Small areas of high impasto were flattened during the lining and the original tacking margins were removed as part of the process, but it is difficult to say whether the edges of the image were trimmed slightly at the same time. The current stretcher is probably contemporary with the lining.

When the picture was acquired, it was evident that it had been coated with a number of varnish layers, which had become heavily discoloured. Varnish layers covering the liner’s paper tape applied to the edges of the picture were found to contain mastic, dammar and pine resins, confirming that the painting had been revarnished at various times in order to ‘refresh’ its appearance. The painting was cleaned in 2021 and these varnishes were removed, but only partially in the red clothes, which have final glazing layers containing a natural resin (possibly pine) and were therefore sensitive to the cleaning materials.

Frame

The frame is original to the painting. Lawrence left a strip of unpainted canvas, approximately 1.4 cm high, across the whole of the bottom edge. The tip of the sitter’s right foot extends right up to this unpainted strip, and it was clearly intended to coincide with the bottom sight edge of the frame. However, the height dimension between the top and bottom sight edges is too small to show the full image: when the painting is framed with the foot touching the bottom edge, an approximately 1.5 cm strip at the top edge with some of the foliage remains hidden behind the frame rebate. In order to show as much of the painting as possible the sight edge of the frame was modified in 2021.

Context

Sir Thomas Lawrence painted the Portrait of Charles William Lambton (‘The Red Boy’) in 1825, at the age of 56, five years after he had been elected President of the Royal Academy.¹⁸ At this time the artist was bringing to a close an extensive series of full‐length portraits of heads of state and military leaders significant in the defeat of Napoleon, as commissioned by the Prince Regent in 1814 and continued after he ascended the throne in 1820 as George IV. This project involved Lawrence travelling across Europe from 1818 to 1820, and resulted in 28 full‐ and half‐length portraits that would ultimately hang in the Waterloo Chamber at Windsor Castle.¹⁹ Some of these large‐scale paintings combined dark, smoke‐filled backgrounds with a central sitter dramatically lit as if by an unknown source.²⁰ The works influenced the artist’s production of The Red Boy in its unusually large scale and complex setting for the portrait of a child.

In addition to his royal duties as both artist and adviser to the king, in 1824, when the government purchased John Julius Angerstein’s collection to found the National Gallery, Lawrence was the sole artist appointed to be part of the superintending body (later Trustees) of the new institution. The artist had been a fast friend of the collector and counted this among a series of losses affecting him in the early 1820s, including the death of his only surviving brother, and his close friend the artist and diarist Joseph Farington. By 1825 Lawrence was at the height of his artistic powers, but also experiencing a high level of exhaustion. At the beginning of the Royal Academy Summer Exhibition in 1825, he confided to his sister he had ‘never been more fagged’ or in danger ‘of failing in my task’, before later in the letter assuring her that he had ‘never painted better’.²¹

Despite sustained popularity and success, Lawrence was never free of financial difficulties, due to the speed at which he spent the money he made. A large part went towards an extensive collection of European old master drawings, which informed his paintings.²² He sought to engage with artistic traditions from the Renaissance, and also to emulate the career of recent British masters, including his predecessor as President of the Royal Academy Sir Joshua Reynolds and Reynolds’s contemporary Thomas Gainsborough. Works by both artists influenced Lawrence’s compositions for some of the Waterloo portraits and The Red Boy. In Sarah Siddons as the Tragic Muse (fig. 14), Reynolds represented light falling on the seated central figure of Siddons, which made her appear to emerge from her darkened sublime surroundings. Even further back in Reynolds’s own work, a similar approach had been adopted with more dynamic effect in the stormy natural setting of Captain the Honourable Augustus Keppel, a painting that had established the artist’s reputation in the early 1750s (fig. 15).

Thomas Gainsborough’s The Blue Boy (fig. 16) reflected the artist’s allegiance to Sir Anthony Van Dyck and was first exhibited in 1770 to little public notice. It is thought to have influenced an early work by Lawrence, Portrait of Arthur Atherley as an Etonian (fig. 17). The Blue Boy continued to be influential into the 1800s, due to its sale to John Hoppner in 1802 and later inclusion in significant exhibitions such as at the British Institution in 1813, where it is likely that Lawrence would have been able to see it again.²³ The Blue Boy set a precedent as a large‐scale portrait of a young boy that could act as a conduit for an artist’s skills and engagement with contemporary poetic thought and practice, something Lawrence would subsequently achieve with The Red Boy.

Subject

The sitter for the painting, Charles William Lambton (1818–1831), was the eldest son of John George Lambton (1792–1840) by his second wife Lady Louisa (1797–1841). John George was Member of Parliament for Durham from 1813, assisted in the preparation of the first Reform Bill in 1832 and was created 1st Earl of Durham the following year. The boy’s maternal grandfather, Charles Grey, 2nd Earl Grey, was Whig Prime Minister from 1830 to 1834. The boy’s mother had previously sat to Lawrence for her portrait in 1821.²⁴ Accounts of Charles William Lambton show great admiration for the child, both from family and contemporary acquaintances. The devotion John George felt towards his eldest son is evident in the warm correspondence sent between them from 1828 to 1830.²⁵

The painting of this six‐ or seven‐year‐old boy is representative of Lawrence’s mature portraiture skills and ambitions, with the artist seeking to elevate the work beyond a simple figure portrait by incorporating poetic and romanticised features in its unusual setting. On 15 July 1824 Lawrence wrote to the boy’s father explaining that while his standard price for a picture of this size and ‘general class’ was 400 guineas, he was asking for 500 guineas for this work due to the ‘additional study and labor [sic] which this subject demands’.²⁶ This suggests that from an early stage in the development of the work he was ambitious for it to be more than a standard portrait and that John George was aware of his intention. Following a visit to the artist’s studio the English poet Bryan Waller Procter wrote to say, ‘What a beautiful boy that is of Lambton’s! Pray do not forget or neglect your yesterday’s intention of lifting him above the level of a portrait.’²⁷

An early sitting for the portrait is documented in an undated letter from Lady Louisa to her husband, in which she writes she has ‘just returned with Charles from his sitting. Sir Thomas has drawn in the figure very carefully, and is to have a very long sitting the next time, I think the picture will be perfectly delightful and I don’t see how anything can look better than the dress.’²⁸ The clothing of the sitter is central to the portrait and, although somewhat outdated, ties it to the contemporary world of the painting’s production. The ‘skeleton suit’ the young boy wears had become popular from the 1780s and ubiquitous in representations of aristocratic boys at the end of the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. Closely associated with English tastes and ‘way of life’, such suits were smart, robust and widely recommended to allow children more freedom to move in the outdoors, physical activity in childhood being viewed as of great importance to their development. While there was some variation, the standard skeleton suit had trousers with a raised waist and a short jacket to which they were fastened with buttons. Underneath the jacket the child wore a white shirt, often with a frilled edge, and white silk hose beneath the trousers, which often finished mid‐calf on the younger boys.²⁹ Charles William Lambton wears a red velvet skeleton suit under a velvet jacket, the costliest form of the suit. This material is indicated by the textured shine Lawrence has given the clothing. The shoes were probably hand made in Moroccan leather, an expensive investment for a growing child.

Red skeleton suits feature in a number of portraits of young boys by Lawrence, with some slight variation to their form. In The Children of John Angerstein, Esq. (fig. 18) the eldest son stands with his back to the viewer thereby obscuring how the jacket and trousers connect, although we can see the jacket is cropped and the trousers have a split hem to allow for greater movement. He wears brown shoes for outdoors, rougher than the black leather of the shoes worn by Lambton. In an earlier portrait, The Children of Ascoyghe Boucherett (formerly misattributed as The Children of John Angerstein) (fig. 19), the boy in the suit wears his jacket fully buttoned up. His undershirt is made of stiffer material and the collar is more angled. It is, however, open and, together with his right sock, which is depicted rolling down, suggests youthful exertion. The portrait of Lambton shows no such indication of physical activity. The closest sitter in costume is the young boy in the portrait of Frances Hawkins and her Son, John James Hamilton (fig. 20), who wears a similar shirt with a ruffled collar, extended red suit and over jacket, with red trousers cropped in the same fashion, and accompanied by black leather shoes. All of these children are portrayed with their hair short, loose and unstyled. It is notable that the aforementioned paintings were made almost 20 years before The Red Boy. By the mid‐1820s the skeleton suit was starting to go out of style, replaced by the emerging fashion for the ‘tunic suit’, so it seems likely that this choice was steered by an influential party.³⁰ Given the earlier quote perhaps this was the boy’s mother, Lady Louisa.

A much‐repeated anecdote relating to the painting purports that the colour of the skeleton suit was changed from yellow to red during its creation. This has been supported by recent scientific investigations that revealed a layer of chrome yellow underneath the clothing of the figure. As the layer is very thin, this suggests that the decision to alter the colour was taken early in the process.³¹ Yellow skeleton suits certainly existed in this period, as visible on one of the sitters in Sir Henry Raeburn’s painting of The Macdonald Children (fig. 21). Lawrence’s first biographer D.E. Williams discussed the amendment of the colour at great length, relating it to Lawrence’s process and the ‘singular indecision in the choice of his colours’. He relays that the colour was objected to as it ‘produced an unpleasant monotony with the browns of the gravel and rocks forming the background’. Williams proceeded to consider whether the yellow had been a good choice in the first place for the ‘sentiment’ of the picture, and if so, why the background had not been revised instead. He asks ‘[m]ight not this back‐ground have been relieved by lichens, and stunted mountain herbage, and sere red foliage – or would not a deep grove, with the luxuriance of forest trees, have been better adapted to the purposes or sentiment of the painting?’ He appears critical of the strength of the colour used to replace it, describing ‘the garish, flashy red … the least suited to express repose, solemnity, and the hallowed serenity of contemplation’.³²

Lawrence has placed his sitter outdoors at night, seated on a rocky point overlooking the sea. While this rock initially appears to mimic the form of an armchair, during the creation of the picture the artist extended the area into the upper left part of the painting, presumably to move away from this identifiable shape and to strengthen the impression of a naturalistic setting (see Technical Notes). The moon is just visible behind a leafy branch in the top left corner and is reflected twice: in the distant sea and in the rock pool at the bottom left. By the knee of the boy’s right leg, folded up under his left leg in a position of comfort, emerges a small patch of flowers emphasising the flowering of his youth. To the right of the young boy is a loose bag that appears to contain a large piece of fabric with a pattern of stars or golden circles upon it.³³ The boy’s left arm supports his head as he looks up dreamily towards the sky. His right arm rests on the ‘arm’ of the rocky backdrop. He is lit as if by a light source internal to the painting, rather than by the moonlight. The image is undeniably Romantic, tinged with a certain melancholy. The setting would have added to the thoughtful characterisation of the young Lambton and his potential, perhaps seeking to associate the figure with developing ideas of childhood freedom and creativity, innocent until corrupted through experience of the world.³⁴ Sir Michael Levey, Lawrence expert and former Director of the National Gallery, suggested the artist may have been consciously referring to poetry of the period on the subject of the inspiration of nature for young children, and he makes links with William Wordsworth’s Lyrical Ballads (1798) and The Prelude (1805).³⁵ Wordsworth framed childhood as a condition of ‘spiritual harmony and closeness to the divine as experienced through nature’.³⁶

The Portrait of Charles William Lambton is undoubtedly one of Lawrence’s masterpieces, and is of an unexpectedly large scale for a young child. The painting is displayed in a Lawrence frame, which the artist designed together with George Morant, his frame‐maker.³⁷ Known as either a Lawrence frame or a Morant frame, Morant’s trade label can be seen on the reverse of this work. Lawrence often persuaded his clients to have the distinctive frame made for their paintings. In 1825 he specified additional charges for this finished portrait: £24 10s. for the frame and £7 for the packing case he supplied.³⁸ The width and high level of decoration on these frames have been the subject of discussion by later academics and curators, but the artist himself is quoted as saying ‘a Frame is so much a part of the Picture’ and can therefore be considered an intentional part of the artwork’s finish.³⁹

By at least the end of 1827 Lawrence had written a poem relating to the work: ‘On the Portrait of the Son of J.G. Lambton, Esq., M.P’. Published in 1828, it is here replicated in full:⁴⁰
Beautiful Boy – thy heavenward thoughts
Are pictured in thine eyes,
Thou hast no taint of mortal birth,
Thy communing is not of earth,
Thy holy musings rise:
Like incense kindled from on high,
Ascending to its native sky.
And such a head might once have graced
The infant Samuel, when
Call’d by the favour of his God,
The youthful priest the Temple trod
Beloved of Heaven and men!
The same devotion on his brow
As brightens in thy forehead now.
Or, thou may’st seem to Fancy’s eye
One borne by arms Divine;
One, whom on Earth a Saviour bless’d
And on whose features left impress’d
The Contact’s holy sign:
A light, a halo, and a grace,
So pure th’ expression of that face.
Or has the Painter’s skill alone
Such grace and glory given?
Clothed thee with attributes which seem
Creations of an angel’s dream,
To raise the soul to Heaven?
No, as he found thee, he arrayed,
And Genius caught what God had made!

Reception

John George Lambton was clearly pleased with the final portrait, and upon seeing the finished work in the artist’s studio exclaimed that it was ‘Most beautiful!’. He had it moved at haste to his home at 13 Cleveland Row where he wrote that it was hung ‘over the chimney‐piece in my bedroom. I therefore see his angelic face the last thing before I go to sleep and the first when I awake.’⁴¹ In a further demonstration of his appreciation for the artist’s skills, the elder Lambton wrote to Lawrence following the close of the 1825 RA exhibition to note, ‘I wished to sit to you myself for a whole length as a fellow to that of Lady Louisa’.⁴² Later commentators such as Miss Croft described the portrait of the young Lambton as ‘not a jot more lovely than he was’, while Prince Leopold referred to the sitter as ‘handsome Charlie’.⁴³

The portrait was exhibited at the Royal Academy in 1825 as Portrait of the Son of J.G. Lambton, Esq., where it was well received. Lawrence was part of that year’s Selection Committee and exhibited eight works in total, all portraits.⁴⁴ In the letter sent during the painting’s creation, B.W. Procter wrote ‘I really think that you need fear nothing (old or new) which can be placed beside it’, indicating that at the time the artist had some concerns about the display of the work in this exhibition.⁴⁵ The painting was hung in the School of Painting above Francis Danby’s The Delivery of Israel out of Egypt (1825; Harris Museum and Art Gallery, Preston, inv. PRSMG: P116). This placement led the reporter from the New Monthly Magazine and Literary Journal to suggest it was, scarcely possible to experience a more delightful feeling than that consequent on turning from [Danby’s] awfully impressive and appalling scene, to this lovely work, which hangs in immediate contact with it, and which consists simply of the portrait of a child six or seven years of age, seated in a natural scene of picturesque beauty. Whether it arise from some indescribable charm in the picture itself, or in the circumstance of its contrast with that just described, we cannot tell; but certain it is that no one even of Sir Thomas’s portraits ever gave us so much delight as this.⁴⁶ In 1930 William Whitley referenced criticism directed at the Hanging Committee for the placement of this work in the School of Painting, a smaller room, and not ‘on the line’. He refers to a protesting critic that claimed the work was ‘completely destroyed by being at such a height’, although this view is not reflected across the contemporary sources.⁴⁷

A number of exhibition reviews gave the portrait high praise. The Literary Chronicle and Weekly Review showed preference to the ‘charming portrait’ of Charles William Lambton above the others Lawrence exhibited ‘on which Sir Thomas has bestowed infinite pains’.⁴⁸ La Belle Assemblée described it as ‘singularly fascinating and lovely’.⁴⁹ The London Magazine and Review referred to the ‘very capital portrait’ as one of Lawrence’s ‘chef d’oeuvres’, ‘florid and rich, even to exuberance, in colour; and harmonious and vigorous in effect’.⁵⁰ The reviews were, however, not entirely uncritical and there was less enthusiasm than there had been for The Calmady Children (1823; The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, inv. 25.110.1), a portrait of two young girls that Lawrence had exhibited the year before.⁵¹ The Times remarked on the ‘sparkling intelligence of youth’ portrayed by Lawrence, but followed with a less favourable comment regarding consistency in the depiction of moonlight.⁵² The Monthly Magazine also discussed this ‘spot of light in a corner of this picture, which, we confess, we cannot understand. It looks like a peep of the moon; but the colouring, in every other part, prohibits the idea of moonlight. If it mean nothing but effect, we should call it “effect defective”.’⁵³

Lawrence retained a level of independence despite the numerous commissions from George IV, and had success in his lifetime across Europe. In 1824 he contributed a replica of a portrait of the duc de Richelieu and Mrs John Scandrett Harford to the Paris Salon and the following summer painted full lengths of the new king, Charles X, and his son, the duc d’Angoulême.⁵⁴ At the next Salon of 1827 he exhibited the Portrait of Charles William Lambton along with a portrait of Marie‐Caroline, Duchesse de Berry (about 1825; Musée de l’Histoire de France, Château de Versailles, inv. MV 8505).⁵⁵ The painter and antiquary the comte de Forbin wrote to Lawrence towards the end of 1827, upon receipt of his portrait for the exhibition, that it was ‘one of the most beautiful productions to come out of your brush for the brilliance, the charm of the execution and the richness of the harmony’. He assured the artist that he had placed it ‘as well as possible’.⁵⁶

At the Paris Salon in 1827 the portrait attracted attention but divided opinion. Some thought it to be a masterpiece, while others were less complimentary. The novelist and critic Stendhal (the pen name of Marie‐Henri Beyle), for example, critiqued the work of Lawrence as slapdash and contrived, but acknowledged that he could remember the face of the sitter two months later.⁵⁷ The artist Thomas Jones wrote to Lawrence quoting a review from a French newspaper that wrote of the figure as ‘so alive, so animated […] its complexion, its pose, its expression all charm you’. He also reported that he had seen a gentleman describing the painting to a listening crowd as Lawrence’s idea of Lord Byron in his youth,⁵⁸ perhaps because Byron had died in April 1824, shortly before the painting was produced. This interpretation became attached to the portrait, reaffirming that it encouraged a romanticised poetic reading. Patrick Noon notes that references were still being made to Lawrence’s painting as a ‘Byronic icon’ in Salon reviews of the 1830s.⁵⁹ In 1856 the poet, journalist and art critic Théophile Gautier recalled the portrait as causing ‘a prodigious sensation: that camellia carnation, those eyes so silky and so brilliant, that pearly visage so sombre and clear it conjures the look of the young Byron; that precocious dreamer astonished many Parisians, who believed they had before them a creation borne [sic] of the fantasy of a poetic brush’.⁶⁰ Awareness of the painting had evidently already reached France prior to the Salon of 1827 as Eugène Delacroix wrote to his sitter Baron Schwiter soon after the opening to recommend that he return to Paris as the Lambton portrait he ‘so admired as a mezzotint’ was in the exhibition.⁶¹ Delacroix’s portrait of Schwiter was influenced both by this portrait by Lawrence and by Constable’s The Cornfield, which was also exhibited at the 1827 Salon.⁶²

Sadly, Charles William Lambton died of tuberculosis on 24 September 1831, aged only 13. The child’s father and mother were devastated by his death, and this loss was clearly felt by other acquaintances, too. Princess Lieven wrote to Lambton’s grandfather Lord Grey, recalling ‘that charming little Lambton was the pet of everyone’.⁶³ The sadness associated with the loss of the young boy continued to be recorded later into the nineteenth century in relation to this painting, as John Timbs wrote in 1860, ‘it is hardly possible to look upon this interesting picture of innocent childhood, of imitative art and beautiful nature, without feeling one’s heart more than “idly stirr’d” at the brief existence of this graceful scion of a noble house’.⁶⁴ In 1882 Lord Ronald Gower recorded a quote referring to this portrait of a ‘beautiful boy, whose features will live for ever in the well‐known picture by Lawrence’.⁶⁵

In the earliest biography of Lawrence published in 1831, the year after the artist’s death, the author Williams pronounced this work as ‘one of the most beautiful paintings of a child, ever produced by art; and … decidedly the best portraiture of childhood by Sir Thomas Lawrence’.⁶⁶ His description of the boy as ‘seated carelessly on a rock, without any of the emblems used by painters to express rank or wealth’ may be undermined by the evident cost of the clothing of the boy, but probably refers to the naturalistic setting. He quotes a contemporary periodical which remarked that ‘[t]he simple action and sweet expression of infantile nature which we see in this portrait were never excelled by Sir Joshua Reynolds in his happiest moments’.⁶⁷

The portrait of Charles William Lambton was exhibited on many occasions throughout the nineteenth century and into the twentieth. It influenced contemporaries in Europe, such as Delacroix (who had visited his studio in July 1825), and works by later British artists, including John Everett Millais. Lawrence’s picture became better known in France through engraving and lithography, ‘much of it pirated’ (see Engravings and Prints).⁶⁸ In 1857 the portrait was displayed at the significant Art Treasures exhibition in Manchester alongside paintings by modern masters of the English School, including Sir William Beechey, J.M.W. Turner, John Constable and William Etty.⁶⁹ In The Art‐Treasures Examiner, accompanied by a poor reproduction, the reviewer ‘Peregrine Sketchly’ describes The Portrait of Charles William Lambton as ‘a sort of half‐real, half‐ideal work. The boy reclines on a rock, in a studied attitude, gazing skyward, with Scheffer‐like intensity. The picture is beautifully wrought, but we cannot get over the absence of all simplicity in its treatment.’⁷⁰ The painting’s location and condition can be tracked through references in the later nineteenth century. In 1876 a report on Lambton Castle was published in the Athenaeum, in which the writer notes that the collection, which he understood to be largely constructed by the 1st Earl of Durham, consisted mostly of works by English painters. Here, the Portrait of Charles William Lambton was hung ‘on the line’ and is referred to as the ‘most famous, if not the best, picture in the collection’. It is described as ‘in capital condition, and may have been restored recently … at any rate it is seldom we meet a Lawrence in such good order’.⁷¹

The portrait was exhibited at the celebrated Fair Children exhibition at the Grafton Galleries in 1895, which displayed 450 ‘examples associated with childhood’ of toys, story books, clothing, and paintings by artists including Van Dyck, Reynolds, Gainsborough, Raeburn, Millais, Johann Zoffany, Edward Burne‐Jones and George Frederic Watts.⁷² Also exhibited was an ‘original sketch’ for Master Lambton lent by H. Cavendish (which passed to H. Pfungst and was then sold to F. Hayward in 1898).⁷³ Lady Emily Augusta (1823–1886), sister of Charles William Lambton, married Lieutenant‐Colonel William Henry Frederick Cavendish (1817–1881) in 1843 and it is likely to have been her son Henry Frederick Compton Cavendish (1854–1928) who lent this ‘original sketch’. The Portrait of Charles William Lambton is the main illustration in a review by Marion Hepworth‐Dixon in the Magazine of Art, described as ‘another work popularised by engraving’. She comments on the condition, ‘[t]he portrait would seem to have suffered at the hands of the cleaner, for its colour appears a trifle more garish than its admirers remember it some quarter of a century ago at Lambton’.⁷⁴ On 7 June 1895, Christie, Manson & Woods sold an engraving by ‘S. Cousins, after Sir T. Lawrence, Master Lambton, 34l’, indicating that demand continued for reproductions of this image.⁷⁵

The portrait was exhibited and reproduced regularly in the twentieth century. Gainsborough’s The Blue Boy was sold in 1921 to Henry Huntington for the record price of £182,000, and the following year Lawrence’s portrait was reproduced in the Illustrated London News and given the title The Red Boy.⁷⁶ Potential sale negotiations for the painting began in 1929, with intermediaries for the dealer Joseph Duveen, the 5th Earl of Durham, valuing the painting at £200,000. However, at auction in 1932, amid the Depression, the work failed to sell with a much lower reserve of £100,000, creating newspaper headlines.⁷⁷ Thirty‐five years later, in 1967 the fame of The Red Boy was further extended when it became the first painting to be included on a British postage stamp. The work itself remained in the family from its commission until 2021, when it was bought for and entered the National Gallery Collection.⁷⁸

Notes