Peter Lely

Sir Peter Lely (14 September 1618 – 7 December 1680)[1][2] was a painter of Dutch origin whose career was nearly all spent in England, where he became the dominant portrait painter to the court.

Not to be confused with Peter Lily.

Sir Peter Lely
Self-portrait, oil on canvas, ca. 1660
Born
Pieter van der Faes

(1618-09-14)14 September 1618
Soest, Westphalia
Died7 December 1680(1680-12-07) (aged 62)
Covent Garden, England
NationalityDutch – English
Known forPainting

Life

Lely was born Pieter van der Faes to Dutch parents in Soest in Westphalia,[3] where his father was an officer serving in the armed forces of the Elector of Brandenburg. Lely studied painting in Haarlem, where he may have been apprenticed to Pieter de Grebber. He became a master of the Guild of Saint Luke in Haarlem in 1637. He is reputed to have adopted the surname "Lely" (also occasionally spelled Lilly) from a heraldic lily on the gable of the house where his father was born in The Hague.

He arrived in London in around 1643,[4] His early English paintings, mainly mythological or religious scenes, or portraits set in a pastoral landscape, show influences from Anthony van Dyck and the Dutch baroque. Lely's portraits were well received, and he succeeded Anthony van Dyck (who had died in 1641) as the most fashionable portrait artist in England. He became a freeman of the Painter-Stainers' Company in 1647 and was portrait artist to Charles I. His talent ensured that his career was not interrupted by Charles's execution, and he served Oliver Cromwell, whom he painted "warts and all", and Richard Cromwell. In the years around 1650 the poet Sir Richard Lovelace wrote two poems about Lely – Peinture and "See what a clouded majesty ..."

Peter Lely – Edward Montagu, 1st Earl of Sandwich

After the English Restoration in 1660, Lely was appointed as Charles II's Principal Painter in Ordinary in 1661, with a stipend of £200 per year, as Van Dyck had enjoyed in the previous Stuart reign.[5] Lely became a naturalised English subject in 1662. The young Robert Hooke came to London to follow an apprenticeship with Lely before being given a place at Westminster School by Richard Busby.

James VII and II, Duke of York, 1661

Demand was high, and Lely and his large workshop were prolific.

After Lely painted a sitter's head, Lely's pupils would often complete the portrait in one of a series of numbered poses. As a result, Lely is the first English painter who has left "an enormous mass of work", although the quality of studio pieces is variable. As Brian Sewell put it:

There may well be thousands of these portraits, ranging from rare prime originals of often quite astonishing quality, to crass workshop replicas by assistants drilled to imitate Lely's way with the fashionable face and repeat the stock patterns of the dress, landscapes, flowers, musical instruments and other essential embellishments of portraiture. On Lely's death in 1680 his executors employed a dozen such slaves to complete for sale the many unfinished canvases stacked about his studio. It is these half-and-half and hardly-at-all Lelys that line the corridors of the indigent aristocracy whose houses are now administered by the National Trust, and no sight is more aesthetically and intellectually numbing, unless it is a corridor of Knellers.[6]

Among his most famous paintings are a series of 10 portraits of ladies from the Royal court, known as the Windsor Beauties, formerly at Windsor Castle but now at Hampton Court Palace; a similar series for Althorp; a series of 12 of the admirals and captains who fought in the Second Anglo-Dutch War, known as the "Flagmen of Lowestoft", now mostly owned by the National Maritime Museum in Greenwich; and his Susannah and the Elders at Burghley House.

His most famous non-portrait work is probably Nymphs by a fountain in Dulwich Picture Gallery.

Nymphs by a Fountain, an atypical mythological work

Lely played a significant role in introducing the mezzotint to Britain, as he realized its possibilities for publicising his portraits. He encouraged Dutch mezzotinters to come to Britain to copy his work, laying the foundations for the English mezzotint tradition.

Lely lived from about 1651 to 1680 at No. 10-11 Great Piazza, Covent Garden. He was knighted in 1679.[7] Lely died soon afterwards at his easel in Covent Garden, while painting a portrait of the Duchess of Somerset. Sir Peter was buried at St Paul's Church, Covent Garden.

Legacy
Susanna and the Elders, 1650–5.

In his lifetime, Lely was known as a skillful connoisseur of art.[8] His collection of Old Masters, including Veronese, Titian, Claude Lorrain and Rubens, and a fabulous collection of drawings, was broken up and sold after his death, raising the immense sum of £26,000.[9] Some items in it which had been acquired by Lely from the Commonwealth dispersal of Charles I's art collections, such as the Lely Venus, were re-acquired by the Royal Collection.

Amongst Lely's pupils were John Greenhill and Willem Wissing.

He was replaced as court portraitist by Sir Godfrey Kneller, also a German-born Dutchman, whose style drew from Lely's but reflecting later Continental trends. Between them they established the basic English portrait style followed by less fashionable painters for decades.

A horse was also named after him, finishing fourth in the 1996 Grand National.

  • Peter Lely's works
  • Earl and Countess of Oxford
  • Sir Robert Worsley, 3rd Baronet
  • Lady Mary Fane by Sir Peter Lely
  • Queen Mary II
  • Portrait of a man, thought to be George Booth, Lord Delamere, 1660
  • Portrait of Lady Elizabeth Strickland, née Pile
  • Catherine of Braganza, Queen of England 1665
  • Portrait of a Lady with a Blue Drape, circa 1660
  • Abraham Cowley, c. 1665–66
  • Two ladies from the Lake family, 1650.
  • Diana Kirke, later Countess of Oxford, 1665
  • A Boy as a Shep
  • Charles II of England, c. 1675
  • Jane Howard, Duchess of Norfolk
  • Dudley, Daughter of Sr. Henry North, Bart., Wife of Sir Thomas Cullum
  • Sir Thomas Fanshawe of Jenkins and his wife Margaret
  • Madonna and Child by Sir Peter Lely
  • Sir William Ashburnham
  • Lady Frances Savile, Later Lady Brudenell
  • Portrait of Margaret Hughes c. 1670.
  • Portrait of Charlotte Lee, Countess of Lichfield 1674

Notes
  1. "Artist Info". www.nga.gov.
  2. "Sir Peter Lely | Dutch painter". Encyclopedia Britannica.
  3. Ellis Waterhouse, Painting in Britain, 1530–1790, 1953, Penguin Books (now Yale History of Art series)
  4. Britannica 2018. Dethloff 2009
  5. Sainty, J.C.; Bucholz, R.O. (1997). Officials of the Royal Household, 1660–1837: Department of the Lord Chamberlain and associated offices. Office-holders in modern Britain. University of London, Institute of Historical Research. p. 51. ISBN 978-1-871348-40-8. Retrieved 1 May 2019. In 1660 Lely was appointed 'Limner and Picture Drawer', being succeeded in 1681 by Riley as 'Painter and Picture Drawer'.
  6. Art History News, quoting his Evening Standard review of the 2012 Lely exhibition "Small but perfectly formed"
  7. "Sir Peter Lely, Dutch Painter". Encyclopædia Britannica. Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc. Retrieved 21 December 2018.
  8. "Sir Peter Lely, Dutch Painter". Encyclopædia Britannica. Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc. Retrieved 21 December 2018.
  9. Cust 1893, p. 21.
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References
  • Cust, Lionel Henry (1893). "Lely, Peter" . In Lee, Sidney (ed.). Dictionary of National Biography. 33. London: Smith, Elder & Co. pp. 19–21.CS1 maint: ref=harv (link)
  • Dethloff, Diana (21 May 2009). "Lely, Sir Peter (1618–1680)". Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (online ed.). Oxford University Press. doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/16419. (Subscription or UK public library membership required.)
  • "Sir Peter Lely". Encyclopædia Britannica. 11 September 2018.
  • Millar, Oliver (2002) [1996]. "Lely, Sir Peter' (inc. bibliography)". Grove Dictionary of Art. 19. London. pp. 119–125.CS1 maint: ref=harv (link)
  • Millar, Oliver (1978). Sir Peter Lely 1618–80. London: National Portrait Gallery.CS1 maint: ref=harv (link)
  • Rossetti, William Michael (1911). "Lely, Sir Peter" . In Chisholm, Hugh (ed.). Encyclopædia Britannica. 16 (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press.CS1 maint: ref=harv (link)
  • Waterhouse, Ellis (1978). Painting in Britain 1530 to 1790 (Fourth ed.). New York: Viking Penguin.
  • Whinney, Margaret; Millar, Oliver (1957). English Art 1625–1714. Oxford: Clarendon Press.CS1 maint: ref=harv (link)
Court offices
Preceded by
Anthony van Dyck		 Principal Painter in Ordinary to the King
1661–1680		 Succeeded by
Godfrey Kneller
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