John Shackleton (died 16 March 1767) was a British painter and draughtsman who produced

history painting History painting is a genre in painting defined by its subject matter rather than any artistic style or specific period. History paintings depict a moment in a narrative story, most often (but not exclusively) Greek and Roman mythology and B ...

s and portraits. His parents and origins are unknown.

Output

Shackleton painted several surviving portraits, for example of Henry Pelham (National Portrait Gallery), William Windham (1717–1761; now at

Felbrigg Hall Felbrigg Hall is a 17th-century English country house near the village of that name in Norfolk. Part of a National Trust property, the unaltered 17th-century house is noted for its Jacobean architecture and fine Georgian interior. Outside ...

, Norfolk), and of John Bristowe, steward to the first duke of Newcastle (now in the Reitlinger Museum of Fine Art,

Maidenhead Maidenhead is a market town in the Royal Borough of Windsor and Maidenhead in the county of Berkshire, England. It lies on the southwestern bank of the River Thames, which at this point forms the border with Buckinghamshire. In the 2021 Census, ...

). From 1749 he was Principal Painter in Ordinary to George II and

George III George III (George William Frederick; 4 June 173829 January 1820) was King of Great Britain and King of Ireland, Ireland from 25 October 1760 until his death in 1820. The Acts of Union 1800 unified Kingdom of Great Britain, Great Britain and ...

. He continued to be paid for portraits of the king and queen up even during 1765–6, when their ''official'' portraits were being done by Allan Ramsay. Several examples of his and his studio's output of royal portraits survive – one of George II dated 1755 is in the Scottish National Portrait Gallery, Edinburgh; another of George II in Room 2 of 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 ...

, London (commissioned by the museum in 1759 – the Museum also holds engravings after his paintings), along with two more of George II in the Royal Collection and others in Fishmongers' Hall, London, and

Museum.

Life

He was a member of the 1755 committee that drew up the first proposal for siting a

royal academy The Royal Academy of Arts (RA) is an art institution based in Burlington House in Piccadilly London, England. Founded in 1768, it has a unique position as an independent, privately funded institution led by eminent artists and architects. Its ...

in London. On 8 March 1758 he was elected to be a member of the Society for the Encouragement of Arts, Manufactures, and Commerce, then in its infancy. He exhibited at the Free Society of Artists from 1763 to 1766. Among the legatees of his will, dated 8 March 1767, were his ‘dear friend Mrs Sarah Rice’, ‘two marble heads said to be done by

Bernini Gian Lorenzo (or Gianlorenzo) Bernini (, ; ; Italian Giovanni Lorenzo; 7 December 1598 – 28 November 1680) was an Italian sculptor and architect. While a major figure in the world of architecture, he was more prominently the leading sculptor ...

to my intimate friend Mr Robt ?ssie of

Wardour Street Wardour Street () is a street in Soho, City of Westminster, London. It is a one-way street that runs north from Leicester Square, through Chinatown, London, Chinatown, across Shaftesbury Avenue to Oxford Street. Throughout the 20th century th ...

, Soho’, and ‘a half-length picture of a Lady by Vandyke and a small landscape by Gaspar Poussin to John Bristow Esqr Keeper of His Majesties Lions in the

Tower A tower is a tall Nonbuilding structure, structure, taller than it is wide, often by a significant factor. Towers are distinguished from guyed mast, masts by their lack of guy-wires and are therefore, along with tall buildings, self-supporting ...

’.

Marriage and issue

On 25 October 1742 (as a parishioner of St George's, Hanover Square, London) he married Mary Ann Regnier.

Sources

* J. R. Fawcett-Thompson, ‘The elusive Mr. Shackleton: light on the principal painter in ordinary to King George II and George III’, The Connoisseur, 165 (1967), 232–9 * B. Stewart and M. Cutten, The dictionary of portrait painters in Britain up to 1920 (1997), 417 · Waterhouse, 18c painters, 341 * J. Kerslake, National Portrait Gallery: early Georgian portraits, 1 (1977), 91, 93, 101, 204, 208–9 * O. Millar, The Tudor, Stuart and early Georgian pictures in the collection of her majesty the queen, 2 vols. (1963), vol. 1, 26, 150; vol. 2, nos. 567–8 * O. Millar, The later Georgian pictures in the collection of her majesty the queen, 1 (1969), xiii n.15, xli *

Horace Walpole Horatio Walpole, 4th Earl of Orford (; 24 September 1717 – 2 March 1797), better known as Horace Walpole, was an English Whig politician, writer, historian and antiquarian. He had Strawberry Hill House built in Twickenham, southwest London ...

, Anecdotes of painting in England: with some account of the principal artists, ed. James Dallaway, ev. and enl. edn 2 (1826), 711 * Samuel Redgrave, ''Artists'' * John Chaloner Smith, ''British Mezzotinto Portraits'', 1 (1878), 317; 2 (1879), 677–8 * Engraved Brit. ports., 1.245; 2.298, 456; 3.437 * B. Nicholson, The treasures of the Foundling Hospital, with a catalogue raisonné based on a draft catalogue by John Kerslake (1972), 32, 34, 50, 78, no. 74 * will, PRO, PROB 11/928, fols. 48r–49r

External links

* * .
Portraits by Shackleton at the

National Portrait Gallery, London The National Portrait Gallery (NPG) is an art gallery in London that houses a collection of portraits of historically important and famous British people. When it opened in 1856, it was arguably the first national public gallery in the world th ...

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Shackelton, John 18th-century English painters English male painters Principal Painters in Ordinary 1767 deaths Year of birth unknown History painters 18th-century English male artists