Cornelius B.Durham

CORNELIUS B.DURHAM (England, 1809-1865)
"Male portrait".
Miniature in oil.
It presents two fractures in the pictorial surface.
Measurements: 15 x 11 cm; 29,5 x 25 cm (frame).

The British painter Cornelius B. Durham was a member of the Royal Academy. In this portrait of a gentleman, he shows a great skill in the detailed capture of the character, as much in his attire and physiognomic details, as in the landscape that is glimpsed in the window. Compositionally, it follows the academicist tradition of the genre of the portrait of an illustrious personage next to a velvet curtain and a table with a book, which here he takes with his left hand, from which he has just removed the suede glove.

Since the Renaissance, miniature portraits, framed in a circle or oval, were pieces for private contemplation. Considered as jewelry, in the seventeenth century they became pieces of personal adornment or a gift object, being mounted as jewelry. They were made in a great variety of techniques, such as oil on copper, tin or ivory, gouaches on parchment or cardboard and, since the 18th century, watercolor on ivory. This delicate art will be lost since the second half of the 19th century, in parallel to the development of photography. During the 19th century, the most common in this type of pieces were historicist representations, often set in the previous century.