#regency art

The first thing that struck me was the color of his hair (in both miniature and original), because Major General Sir Arthur's hair was still mostly brown at this point. Then I read in the description that it's powdered. Although powder and queues were still regulation in that period, Wellesley rather notably never wore powder--he thought it was unhealthy--so it's interesting that he was painted with it in his hair.

Another curious detail is the color of his sashes. The sash around his waist is indicative of an officer, but they were typically red. Indeed, if you look at the original, both sashes are much darker. I wonder if they were painted so light originally, or if they were darker and have faded with age. However, I have seen one or two other portraits, including another miniature, where the sash across his chest is similar pink.

There are changes in his face between the two. Hoppner's jawline is much smoother than Wright's, as Wright emphasizes the chin more. Wright also looks like he gave Sir Arthur a dimpled chin. Hoppner has only a few hints at possible smile lines or possible five o'clock shadow, but Wright adds circles around his eyes. He looks older in Wright's when he was only in his mid-thirties. Admittedly, I somewhat like the expression in Wright's more, it's softer, but it's curious that it tweaks as much as it does. The one thing I think Wright does do better is capture Sir Arthur's hair, which never lay flat.

Now, the Cleveland descriptions says, "A five o’clock shadow is visible on the famously hirsute soldier" and it took me several days (admittedly with much distraction and notetaking) and four books to find a second source to back this up. Finally, I found in Holmes a passage which said that he had a heavy growth of beard, often shaved twice a day and hated to be disturbed when shaving.

It's not my favorite miniature of Sir Arthur, but I did have fun looking into it. And my Wellington Notes doc now has something like seven thousand more words (we've crossed the 100 page mark!), mostly focused on his appearance and personality, which is going to be useful going forward.