Joseph Gibbs

Gainsborough, Thomas (1727-1788)

Item type:

painting

Date of creation:

1755

Height:

60.6 cm  (23 7/8 in.)

Width:

50.2 cm  (19 3/4 in.)

Technique / Medium:

oil on canvas

Description

Joseph Gibbs was prominent in the musical life of East Anglia as an organist, and was also a talented composer, though little of his work survives. Here Gibbs is shown composing a sonata, with volumes of music by the Italian composers Geminiani and Corelli beside him. In the 1750s when this portrait was made Gainsborough and Joseph Gibbs were both members of the Ipswich Musical Club. Gainsborough's portraits of his musician friends are among his most sensitive, reflecting his own love of music; according to an obituary he 'thought he was not intended by nature for a painter, but a musician'.

People as subjects

Gibbs, Joseph (1698-1788) (Composer portrait)

Musical works

legible music notation

RIdIM images

Image URLs

image link 2
image link 3

RIdIM record id

5532

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