John Hasler

One of five children, Jane Beetham (later Read) was born into a creative family: her mother, Isabella trained under John Smart and became a successful silhouette artist whilst her father, Edward, had various careers that included glass painting, bookselling, acting and inventing, his most successful invention being the washing machine. Jane helped out in her mother’s silhouette studio from an early age and had drawing lessons from the portrait painter John Opie. It is said that Opie had an amorous relationship with his young pupil though she chose to marry the lawyer John Read, a widower ten years her senior. The couple had a daughter, Cordelia, with her own colourful story.

Jane’s early work was stylistically influenced by her mother who also reverse painted silhouettes on glass. Jane created her own distinctive style by adding outdoor background details before further refining her technique to delineate her sitters’ features in a style that was more akin to a portrait miniature.

This silhouette of a gentleman wearing a skinny pigtail wig, coat with deep lapels and neatly knotted cravat hails from Jane’s middle period. It is reverse painted on convex glass and backed with wax under a verre églomisé surround, probably painted by her father. The wax has a small blemish at 11 o’clock and there is paint loss to the very top edge. The sitter is indistinctly named on the backing paper with a note that he ‘died Sept 2nd 1850? in his 89 Year’. Research suggests this may be the John Hasler who was born around 1760 in South Stoneham, Hampshire.

The turned fruitwood frame is original to the silhouette; it has five old worm holes to the bottom edge. There is evidence that this piece was once backed with Mrs Beetham’s trade label though this is now gone leaving just a loose paper covering.