{"meta":{"version":"2.1","_links":{"self":{"href":"https://api.vam.ac.uk/v2/object/O74845"},"collection_page":{"href":"https://collections.vam.ac.uk/item/O74845/"}},"images":{"_primary_thumbnail":"https://framemark.vam.ac.uk/collections/2006AG3036/full/!100,100/0/default.jpg","_iiif_image":"https://framemark.vam.ac.uk/collections/2006AG3036/","_alt_iiif_image":[],"imageResolution":"high","_images_meta":[{"assetRef":"2006AG3036","copyright":"© Victoria and Albert Museum, London","sensitiveImage":false},{"assetRef":"2006AT1250","copyright":"© Victoria and Albert Museum, London","sensitiveImage":false},{"assetRef":"2017JX8649","copyright":"©Victoria and Albert Museum, London","sensitiveImage":false}]},"see_also":{"_iiif_pres":"https://iiif.vam.ac.uk/collections/O74845/manifest.json","_alt_iiif_pres":[]}},"record":{"systemNumber":"O74845","accessionNumber":"P.15-1931","objectType":"Miniature","titles":[{"title":"Jesus Christ","type":""}],"summaryDescription":"This miniature is quite unlike anything else that Isaac Oliver is known to have painted. The image is built up entirely in terms of light and shade, stippled with tiny flecks of paint, without the definitive outline that had been the ideal of Nicholas Hilliard and other early miniature painters. Oliver is here striving to copy the effects of Italian Baroque painting, with its misty religiosity. This miniature was in the collection of the famous 18th-century collector Dr Richard Mead, and was particularly admired at that time for the soft-focus effect of its extraordinary stipple technique, which was reminiscent of the work of the Italian artist Antonio Correggio (1489-1534). When it was painted, however, there was little interest among English patrons for anything other than portraiture, and one can only speculate for whom such a work would have been intended.","physicalDescription":"Miniature painting of the head of Christ in an oval frame.","artistMakerPerson":[{"name":{"text":"Oliver, Isaac","id":"A8707"},"association":{"text":"artist","id":"AAT25103"},"note":""}],"artistMakerOrganisations":[],"artistMakerPeople":[],"materials":[{"text":"watercolour","id":"x33202"},{"text":"vellum","id":"x42751"}],"techniques":[{"text":"painting","id":"AAT54216"}],"materialsAndTechniques":"Watercolour on vellum stuck onto plain card","categories":[{"text":"Christianity","id":"THES48978"},{"text":"Paintings","id":"THES48917"},{"text":"Religion","id":"THES48900"}],"styles":[{"text":"Stuart","id":"AAT21037"},{"text":"Jacobean","id":"AAT107014"},{"text":"English School","id":"x44855"}],"collectionCode":{"text":"PDP","id":"THES48595"},"images":["2006AG3036","2006AT1250","2017JX8649"],"imageResolution":"high","galleryLocations":[{"current":{"text":"90A","id":"THES49164"},"free":"","case":"3","shelf":"","box":""}],"partTypes":[[{"text":"miniature","id":"AAT33936"}]],"contentWarnings":[{"apprise":"No","note":""}],"placesOfOrigin":[{"place":{"text":"England","id":"x28826"},"association":{"text":"painted","id":"x30138"},"note":""}],"productionDates":[{"date":{"text":"ca. 1610","earliest":"1605-01-01","latest":"1614-12-31"},"association":{"text":"painted","id":"x30138"},"note":""}],"associatedObjects":[],"creditLine":"","dimensions":[{"dimension":"Height","value":"53","unit":"mm","qualifier":"","date":{"text":"","earliest":null,"latest":null},"part":"","note":""},{"dimension":"Width","value":"43","unit":"mm","qualifier":"","date":{"text":"","earliest":null,"latest":null},"part":"","note":""}],"dimensionsNote":"Dimensions taken from: Strong, Roy. <u>Artists of the Tudor Court: the Portrait Miniature Rediscovered 1520-1620.</u>. London: The Victoria and Albert Museum, 1983. ","marksAndInscriptions":[{"content":"'IO'","inscriber":{"name":{"text":"","id":""},"association":{"text":"","id":""}},"date":{"text":"","earliest":null,"latest":null},"description":"","interpretation":"","language":"","medium":"","method":"","position":"","script":"","translation":"","transliteration":"","type":"","note":"Signed to the right monogram"}],"objectHistory":"COLLECTIONS:  Dr Richard Mead (1673-1754); recorded by George Vertue between 1736 and 1741 (Notebooks, IV, Walpole Society, XXIV, 1934-35, p. 187); recorded in Musei Meadiani Pars Altera, Langford, 1755 under the section Picturae Minori Formae: “Christi caput longa caesarie falvescente promissa barbe et oculis occlusis, cui gratias omnes divinas circumfluit artiflex.  Isaaci Oliver celberrimi pictoris opus praestantissimum” (in the British Library’s Life of Dr. Richard Mead.  Catalogue of Dr. Mead’s Library, Museum etc, London, 1754-55); sold on the fourth day of the Mead sale, 14th March 1755 (lot 38); “Head of our saviour very capital, by Isaac Oliver”; purchased by Margaret Cavendish Harley, Duchess of Portland (d. 1785); op. cit, loc. Cit.); sold by auction by Mr. Skinner & Co. 24th April 1786 and following days, 24th May (lot 2947): “A remarkable fine MINIATURE HEAD of OUR SAVIOUR by Isaac Oliver, set in gold.  Nothing can exceed the gracefulness, benevolence, and meekness, expressed in this picture.  N.B. It was purchased out of the well-known Collection of the late Dr. Mead”; purchased by George 5th Earl of Stamford; sold by the 10th Earl of Stamford, Christie’s 3rd March 1931 (lot 25); purchased for the V&A.\r\n\r\n","historicalContext":"","briefDescription":"Miniature painting by Isaac Oliver of the head of Christ, watercolour on vellum.  Great Britain, probably after ca. 1610.","bibliographicReferences":[{"reference":{"text":"","id":""},"details":"","free":"Strong, Roy. <u>Artists of the Tudor Court: the Portrait Miniature Rediscovered 1520-1620</u>.  London: The Victoria and Albert Museum, 1983. Cat. 175, pp. 113-114. \n\nPart Citation:\r\n\r\n\"One of the most extraordinary of all Oliver’s miniatures, both in respect of style and subject-matter.  The head is built up entirely in terms of light and shade without any linear effects which sets it apart as an extreme example of the artist’s reaction to Hilliard’s linear tradition and a vivid index of his own response to Italian Renaissance painting.\r\n\r\nThe dating of the <i>Head of Christ</i> is not easy, nor is it helped by any stylistic parallels; [possibly]after c. 1610.  That religious works were coming back into fashion may be measured by Robert Cecil’s decoration of the Chapel at Hatfield House.  Indeed the closest parallel is the bust of Christ at Hatfield which was there before 1629, probably one of Robert Cecil’s purchases, by an unidentified Italian artist of the early Baroque period (E. Auerbach and C. K. Adams, <i>Paintings and Sculpture at Hatfield House</i>, London, 1971, p. 109 (119), pl. 94).  The head is of a generalized North Italian type in the manner of Correggio, which would account for the very high esteem in which it was held in the eighteenth century, though modern taste prefers Oliver’s portraits to what are now regarded as derivative religious pieces.  \r\n\r\n\r\n"},{"reference":{"text":"","id":""},"details":"p. 211","free":"Catharine MacLeod with Rab MacGibbon, Victoria Button, Katherine Coombs and Alan Derbyshire.‎ <u>Elizabethan treasures : miniatures by Hilliard and Oliver</u>. London : National Portrait Gallery, 2019.‎ ISBN: 9781855147027‎"}],"production":"","productionType":{"text":"","id":""},"contentDescription":"Painting of the head of a man with shoulder-length hair, turned to left, his head turned slightly to the front and his gaze cast down.","contentPlaces":[],"associatedPlaces":[],"contentPerson":[{"text":"Jesus Christ","id":"N1515"}],"associatedPerson":[],"contentOrganisations":[],"associatedOrganisations":[],"contentPeople":[],"associatedPeople":[],"contentEvents":[],"associatedEvents":[],"contentOthers":[],"contentConcepts":[],"contentLiteraryRefs":[],"galleryLabels":[{"text":"Isaac Oliver About 1560-1617\r\nHead of Christ\nProbably after 1610\n\nIn Protestant England religious subjects were unusual.\nThis work is also remarkable for the soft-focus effect created by builing up the image in tiny dots.\nWatercolour on vellum, stuck to pasteboard\r\n\nSigned lower right 'IO' in monogram\r\nMuseum no. P.15-1931","date":{"text":"","earliest":null,"latest":null}}],"partNumbers":["P.15-1931"],"accessionNumberNum":"15","accessionNumberPrefix":"P","accessionYear":1931,"otherNumbers":[],"copyNumber":"","aspects":["WHOLE"],"assets":["2019LM6045","2019LT1106","2019LW6012"],"recordModificationDate":"2025-09-01","recordCreationDate":"2003-02-21","availableToBook":false}}