Newton, I. or J. (McKechnie Section 5)

Recorded by Jackson (Dictionary), who, although she had seen an example of his work, gives no date for him. The one silhouette known to me (illustrated in Chapter Five) appears to have been painted c. 1838-40. There is a trade label on the reverse which affords the only information about Newton that we have. It is damaged, and only part of the address remains; the name of the town being missing: ‘— No. 4, Council House Street, opp[osite]/London Hotel'. Having failed to trace an artist of this name and period who lived at an address with which these incomplete details conform, I can only list some artists, named Newton, who are known to have worked at this time, one of whom may have been the profilist. (Although the range of prices given on Newton's trade label suggests that he may have painted silhouettes on paper, there is no evidence, stylistic or other, to lead one to identify him with the Newton, for whom no initial is known, listed in Section Two.).

Foskett records a John Newton who was working at 82 Dame Street, Dublin, in 1842. He may have been identical with John Orr Newton, a figure painter who exhibited at the Royal Hibernian Academy 1835-43; in 1843 he was sending in work from an address at Darragh Villa, Newtownmountkennedy. It seems unlikely that the profilist was Sir William John Newton, who was probably too successful as a miniaturist to wish to take up silhouette work, and, in any case, signed his portrait miniatures `Wm. J. Newton.' It is possible that the profilist was H. J. Newton, a painter who in 1833 sent in to the Royal Academy a Portrait of an Artist and about whom no other information (Graves gives no address) is available.

The illustrated silhouette is painted against a background of dark-grey body colour, with full detail painted in very thin gum arabic. A touch of white was used on the hair (which is carefully painted) for highlighting. The high collar of the shirt is left white, with a little detail in shading. All detail is painted with considerable skill, the work on the eyelash in particular showing a practised hand. There is no bust-line termination.

The work is framed in papier mâché, and the ivory oval is rather small (2 1/2 x 2 in.).

The damaged example of Newton's trade label reads as follows:

J. NEWTON

Respectfully informs the Ladies and Gentlemen of –

-takes MINIATURE PROFILES in the neatest

Ma[nner] (2s. 6d) — 5s. — and 10s. 6d. each.

J. N. flatters himself that the Style of his Performanc[e]

il give Satisfaction to those who may Honor him with

ts.

Ladies and Gentlemen waited on at their own Houses.

N.B. Time of sitting one Minute

— No. 4, Council House Street, opp[osite]

London Hotel.

Ills. 142, 1513