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Artist or Maker: Sir Henry Raeburn, R.A., P.R.S.A. (1756-1823)
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Provenance: with Forbes & Paterson, London, 1901.
R.H. Mungall; Christie's, London, 19 June 1925, lot 159 (145 gns. to Mitchell).
with Findlay Galleries, New York, 1940, from whom purchased by Mrs Helen Nelson, Kansas City, until 2003.
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Exhibited: London, Paterson's Gallery, 1901, no. 2 (lent by W.B. Paterson).
Glasgow, Scottish Exhibition, 1911.
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Literature: Sir Walter Armstrong, Sir Henry Raeburn, London, 1901, p.107.
J. Greig, Sir Henry Raeburn, R.A., London, 1911, p.52.
R. Walker, Regency Portraits, London, 1985, p.328, pl.786.
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Notes: J. Neagle, 1802.
B. Smith, 1808-09.
Henry Mackenzie (1745-1831) was one of the leading Scottish literary and legal figures of his day. Born and educated in Edinburgh, he pursued a successful legal career becoming attorney for the crown in Scotland, and Controller of Taxes. Hailed by Sir Walter Scott as 'our Scottish Addison', Mackenzie was also well known for his writing. He was one of the founding members of the Mirror, a periodical based upon the model of the Spectator, and the earliest journal of its kind in Scotland.
As well as writing essays on politics, Mackenzie was a prolific novelist, publishing anonymously. His first work The Man of Feeling (1771), was a sentimental novel in the style of Richardson, achieving widespread popularity. In 1783, the young Robert Burns wrote that The Man of Feeling was 'a book I prize next to the bible', and in turn Mackenzie was one of the earliest critics to champion Burns, describing him as a 'heaven-taught ploughman'.
This striking portrait dating from c.1790-95, was painted when Raeburn had returned to Edinburgh from London and Italy to become the most sought-after portraitist of emminent Scotsmen. Mackenzie was to sit for Raeburn on several occasions, commenting that 'he certainly made one good picture from me'.
The present work is the first portrait of Mackenzie that Raeburn painted, before the sitter 'took to his wig'. It was engraved in 1802 by J. Neagle for the frontispiece to Chalmer's British Essayists, and it was not until c.1810 that a second portrait type by Raeburn was created, in which Mackenzie wears a curly wig, now in the National Portrait Gallery, London.
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