In his vicious and lengthy review of Edward Fryer’s Works of James Barry, Esq. Historical Painter (1809), Richard Payne Knight was at some pains to detail the genesis of what he considered to the painter’s ‘radical error’: the profoundly perverse narcissism or ‘morbid vanity’ that seemed to fuel the Irish...
The discourse of the 'British School' which took shape around 1800 was both a step towards, and a means of apprehending the anticipation of, the artistic field in its modern formation. This chapter elaborates the regulations surrounding entry into the Schools and progression through them, in which works of art...
