The golden age of the english painting from Reynolds to Turner

The Portrait of Francis George Hare (1786-1842), known as Master Hare or Infancy, is one of the most famous works by English portrait painter Joshua Reynolds. This spontaneous painting exudes great gentleness, evoking the innocence and delicacy of childhood. The little boy, son of the writer Francis Hare Nayloret and his wife Georgiana Shipley, is shown here at the age of two. The landscape in the background places the portrait in a pastoral setting. The engraving is a late nineteenth-century black manner by Léon Salles, an artist-engraver who won several medals at the Salon des Artistes Français. Earlier engravings were made from the same painting, notably by Robert Thew in 1790.