Thomas Watson (English, 1743-1781)
after Joseph Wright of Derby (English, 1734-1797)
Miss Kitty Dressing
INV-1586
Thomas Watson (English, 1743-1781)
after Joseph Wright of Derby (English, 1734-1797)1781
Miss Kitty Dressing
Thomas Watson (English, 1743-1781) after Joseph Wright of Derby (English, 1734-1797) →mezzotintprint
Date
1781
Medium
Mezzotint, with traces of engraving, in dark brown on ivory laid paper
Dimensions
Image: 40.9 × 32.9 cm (16 1/8 × 13 in.); Plate: 45.3 × 33 cm (17 7/8 × 13 in.); Sheet: 58.7 × 46 cm (23 1/8 × 18 1/8 in.)
Museum
Art Institute of Chicago
Location
Chicago, IL
Credit
Elizabeth Glore Memorial and Print and Drawing Purchase funds
Thomas Watson was one of the most gifted mezzotint engravers of his generation. In this intimate and slightly humorous example after a painting by Joseph Wright of Derby, he achieved a convincing sense of interior candlelight illumination through his soft touch. The portraits in this image appear to depict the same girls found in Wright’s similarly lit composition An Experiment on a Bird in the Air Pump, an oil painting now in the National Gallery in London.