John Astley (painter) - Career As Painter

Career As Painter

In London, in the 1740s, Astley studied with Joshua Reynolds under the artist Thomas Hudson. He later went to study in Rome and Florence in 1747 (one of his teachers was Pompeo Batoni), before establishing his career during several years in Dublin, Ireland, and afterwards settling in England.

Of his work, the Biographical Dictionary of 1789 said, "The best pictures he ever painted were copies of the Bentivolios, and Titian's Venus ...". Horace Walpole claimed Astley's prominence was based "on the peculiarity of his good fortune, rather than by his exertions as an artist ..." and added that "his estimated his profession only by his gains, and having obtained a fortune, treated all future study with contemptuous neglect". Among Astley's own students was the engraver and historical painter John Keyse Sherwin, while Cheshire portraitist Charles Hoyland, who reportedly studied in Rome with Astley, imitated his style.

The painter "had much talent, particularly in portraits", wrote Samuel Redgrave in his 1878 dictionary of English artists. "His color was agreeable, the composition original, drawing fair, but the finish slight, and character and expression weak.

• Astley's portrait of British banking heir Tyringham Backwell (1754 — 1777), painted prior to 1777.

To Sir Horace Mann, 1st Baronet, an Astley admirer and subject, Horace Walpole wrote of a visit to one of Astley's exhibitions in 1752, declaring, "I confess myself a little prejudiced, for he has drawn the whole Pigwigginhood: but he has got too much into the style of the four thousand English painters about town, and is so intolerable as to work for money, not for fame: in short, he is not such a Rubens, as in your head".

Among John Astley's sitters were:

• the artist Sir Joshua Reynolds
• architect Benjamin Latrobe
• Lady Dukinfield Daniel, who became the artist's second wife
• Sir Thomas Sebright, 5th baronet
• Sir Horace Mann (the 1751 pastel portrait was owned by Horace Walpole)
• Marcus Beresford, 1st Earl of Tyrone, his wife, and daughter, in a group portrait
• Peter John Fremeaux
• Sir Capel Molyneux and his children, in a group portrait (1758, now in the collection of the Ulster Museum in Belfast)
• Rev. Thomas Alleyne of All Saints Church, Loughborough
• Mary Woodyeare, third wife of Hon. Morgan Vane and a daughter-in-law of 2nd Baron Barnard
• Mary Weston (portrait attributed to Astley)
• Colonel Thomas Pepper (now in the collection of the Trinity Art Research enter, Crookshank-Glin Collection)

Astley also painted a portrait of William Shakespeare, which, as reported in the December 1787 issue of the European Magazine, the artist Gilbert Stuart called "far preferable to the famous head in the collection of the Duke of Chandos". A gallery of some of Astley's works is on WikiGallery.org.

Some sources state that Astley gave up painting after his 1759 second marriage, to the wealthy widow, but a contemporary account indicates that he continued to work after that union: "Beau Astley has contributed half-a-dozen phizes, which, he tells me, he painted for fun; the better luck, so much for being a squire". Another source states that Astley, although now rich, continued to accept commissions and charged a steep "20 guineas, the usual price".