Sitters

Curated by Tomás Ferreira

Everyone in this room paid, or was paid, to sit still. For four hundred years portraits were the pictures most often commissioned in Europe: records of marriages, promotions, inheritances and vanity. Look at the hands; they often say more than the faces.

Walk in

12 works2 visits

Checklist

In the order you meet them, clockwise from the far wall.

1
North wall
Peter Paul Rubens
Flemish, 1577–1640
Portrait of Isabella Brant, c. 1620–25
Oil on wood
53 × 46 cm (20 ¾ × 18 in.)
2
North wall
Joseph Badger
American, born The Thirteen Colonies, 1708–1765
Jeremiah Belknap, c. 1758
Oil on canvas
107 × 84 cm (42 ¼ × 33 in.)
3
North wall
Joshua Reynolds
British, 1723–1792
Portrait of the Ladies Amabel and Mary Jemima Yorke, c. 1761
Oil on canvas
196 × 170 cm (77 ¼ × 67 in.)
4
North wall
Washington Allston
American, 1779–1843
Samuel Williams, c. 1817
Oil on canvas
142.2 × 111.8 cm (56 × 44 in.)
5
North wall
John Singleton Copley
American, born The Thirteen Colonies, 1738–1815
Nathaniel Hurd, c. 1765
Oil on canvas
76.2 × 64.8 cm (30 × 25 ½ in.)
6
East wall
John Singer Sargent
American, born Italy, 1856–1925
Portrait of Lisa Colt Curtis, 1898
Oil on canvas
219.3 × 104.8 cm (86 ¼ × 41 ¼ in.)
7
East wall
Portrait of a Couple, c. 1580–88
Oil on canvas
99.8 × 140.5 cm (39 ¼ × 55 ¼ in.)
8
South wall
Rembrandt van Rijn
Dutch, 1606–1669
Portrait of a Woman, 1635 or earlier
Oil on wood
77.5 × 64.8 cm (30 ½ × 25 ½ in.)
9
South wall
Pierre-Auguste Renoir
French, 1841–1919
Romaine Lacaux, 1864
Oil on fabric
81.3 × 65 cm (32 × 25 ½ in.)
10
West wall
Benjamin West
American, born The Thirteen Colonies, 1738–1820
Elizabeth Shewell West and Her Son, Raphael, c. 1770
Oil on canvas
66.5 × 66.3 cm (26 ¼ × 26 in.)
11
West wall
Diego Velázquez
Spanish, 1599–1660
Portrait of the Jester Calabazas, c. 1631–32
Oil on canvas
175 × 106 cm (69 × 41 ¾ in.)
12
West wall
Frans Hals
Dutch, c. 1581–1666
Portrait of Tieleman Roosterman, 1634
Oil on canvas
117 × 87 cm (46 × 34 ¼ in.)