Artwork
H Beard Print Collection
H Beard Print Collection is a print by the Romanticist artist John Greenhill. It dates from 1 and is held in the collection of the Victoria and Albert Museum. This print depicts Henry Harris as Cardinal Wolsey in a performance of Henry VIII, a play by Shakespeare and Fletcher.
About this work
This print shows Henry Harris playing Cardinal Wolsey in a Shakespeare play. Greenhill made the first oil portrait of Harris in this role. The engraving copies that oil, printed for a 1820 Shakespeare book.
Downes, a theater man in 1708, wrote that Harris’s Wolsey looked and moved just right for the part.
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Overview
This print depicts Henry Harris as Cardinal Wolsey in a performance of Henry VIII, a play by Shakespeare and Fletcher. The image is an engraving created by Henry Dawe, based on an earlier oil portrait.
Subject & Meaning
The print captures Henry Harris, a 17th-century actor, in character as Cardinal Wolsey. It is notable for being one of the earliest known images of an actor in a specific Shakespearean role.
Technique & Style
The engraving is a reproduction of a portrait by John Greenhill, executed in a style characteristic of 17th-century English portraiture. The original oil painting is now held by the Garrick Club.
History & Provenance
The print was published in 1820 as the frontispiece to Wilson's Illustrated Shakespeare. The original portrait was painted by John Greenhill in 1664, and the engraving was made by Henry Dawe.
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Artist & collection
Artist
John Greenhill was an English portrait painter, a pupil of Peter Lely, who approached his teacher in artistic excellence, but whose life was cut short by a dissolute lifestyle.
