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Mr. Philip D. Burden
P.O. Box 863,
Chalfont St. Giles, Bucks HP6 9HD,
UNITED KINGDOM
Tel: +44 (0) 1494 76 33 13
Email: enquiries@caburden.com
His portrait was very much desired for Vanity Fair, so wrote John Murray (Darwin’s publisher) to Darwin, 10 May 1871. Darwin’s initial reaction was ‘I could not endure to give sittings to his artists.’. Eventually he was convinced and although the finished print is unsigned documentary evidence points to the artist being the famous Frenchman James Tissot (1836-1902). Portraits of Darwin are normally quite stark, here a congenial image is portrayed of a relaxed man.
This print was published in ‘Vanity Fair’ for 30 September 1871. Its owner Thomas Gibson Bowles (1841-1922) was brought up in a bohemian household and after a short period in the civil service became a journalist. In 1868 he began his own society journal and called it ‘Vanity Fair’. On 30 January 1869 he introduced the first full paged coloured caricature, of Benjamin Disraeli, and sales never looked back. In the words of Matthews and Mellini it was ‘the most successful Society magazine in the history of English journalism’. Provenance: private American collection. Arlott (1952); Harris & Ormond (1976); Matthews & Mellini (1982); ODNB; Savory (1979).