John Hayls, also Hailes (1600–1679), was an English

Baroque The Baroque ( , , ) is a Western Style (visual arts), style of Baroque architecture, architecture, Baroque music, music, Baroque dance, dance, Baroque painting, painting, Baroque sculpture, sculpture, poetry, and other arts that flourished from ...

-era

portrait painter Portrait painting is a Hierarchy of genres, genre in painting, where the intent is to represent a specific human subject. The term 'portrait painting' can also describe the actual painted portrait. Portraitists may create their work by commissio ...

, principally known for his portrait of

Samuel Pepys Samuel Pepys ( ; 23 February 1633 – 26 May 1703) was an English writer and Tories (British political party), Tory politician. He served as an official in the Navy Board and Member of Parliament (England), Member of Parliament, but is most r ...

Life and work

Hayls was a contemporary and rival of Sir

Peter Lely Sir Peter Lely (14 September 1618 – 30 November 1680) was a painter of Dutch origin whose career was nearly all spent in England, where he became the dominant portrait painter to the court. He became a naturalised British subject and was kn ...

and Samuel Cooper. He was mentioned in the diary of

where he is referred to as "Hales". An extract from 15 February 1665-6 reads, "''Mr Hales began my wife's portrait in the posture we saw one of my Lady Peters, like a St. Katherine''". Another extract of 17 March 1666 read:

"''...at noon, home to dinner, and presently with my wife out to Hales's, where I am still infinitely pleased with my wife's picture. I paid him 14 l for it, and 25 s for the frame, and I think it is not a whit too dear for so good a picture. It is not yet quite finished and dry, so as to be fit to bring home yet. This day I begin to sit, and he will make me, I think, a very fine picture. He promises it shall be as good as my wife's, and I sit to have it full of shadows, and do almost break my neck looking over my shoulder to make the posture for him to work by.''"

Pepys was, evidently, so pleased with his wife's portrait, that he commissioned a portrait of himself (see image), and also persuaded his father Thomas Pepys to sit for the artist. Pepys also mentioned that Hayls painted the actor Joseph Harris as

Henry V Henry V may refer to: People * Henry V, Duke of Bavaria (died 1026) * Henry V, Holy Roman Emperor (1081/86–1125) * Henry V, Duke of Carinthia (died 1161) * Henry V, Count Palatine of the Rhine (–1227) * Henry V, Count of Luxembourg (1216–1281 ...

. Hayls also painted portraits of Colonel John Russell (third son of Francis Russell, 4th Earl of Bedford), Lady Diana Russell, and the poet Thomas Flatman. He was known as a good copyist of the works of

Van Dyck Sir Anthony van Dyck (; ; 22 March 1599 – 9 December 1641) was a Flemish Baroque artist who became the leading court painter in England after success in the Spanish Netherlands and Italy. The seventh child of Frans van Dyck, a wealt ...

. He lived in Southampton Street,

Bloomsbury Bloomsbury is a district in the West End of London, part of the London Borough of Camden in England. It is considered a fashionable residential area, and is the location of numerous cultural institution, cultural, intellectual, and educational ...

, London, for some years, but then moved to a house in Long Acre, where he died suddenly in 1679. John Hoskins painted a limning of Hayls, a drawing of which was made by

George Vertue George Vertue (1684 – 24 July 1756) was an English engraver and antiquary, whose notebooks on British art of the first half of the 18th century are a valuable source for the period. Life Vertue was born in 1684 in St Martin-in-the-Fields ...

(now in the

British Museum The British Museum is a Museum, public museum dedicated to human history, art and culture located in the Bloomsbury area of London. Its permanent collection of eight million works is the largest in the world. It documents the story of human cu ...

)

References

;Attribution

External links

John Hayls online
(Artcyclopedia)
John Hayls on Artnet

Archive of works by John Hayls
(

National Portrait Gallery National Portrait Gallery may refer to: * National Portrait Gallery (Australia), in Canberra * National Portrait Gallery (Sweden), in Mariefred *National Portrait Gallery (United States), in Washington, D.C. *National Portrait Gallery, London ...

)
Portrait of Sir Thomas Viner
(Phillip Mould)
"Mr Hales" in Pepys diaries

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Hayls, John 1600 births 1679 deaths British Baroque painters 17th-century English painters English male painters English portrait painters