The Rose and Crown Club was a club for artists, collectors and connoisseurs of art in early 18th-century London, England.

History

The Rose and Crown Club "for Eminent Artificers of this Nation" was formed by 1704, when the engraver

George Vertue George Vertue (1684 – 24 July 1756) was an English engraver and antiquary, whose notebooks on British art of the first half of the 18th century are a valuable source for the period. Life Vertue was born in 1684 in St Martin-in-the-Fields, ...

was admitted; while it lasted, the club was among the more important of clubs for artists and connoisseurs. According to

John Smibert John Smibert (rarely spelled Smybert; ; 24 March 1688 – 2 April 1751) was a Scottish-born painter, regarded as the first academically trained artist to live and work regularly in British America. Career Born in Edinburgh on 24 March 1688, Smi ...

's biographer Richard Saunders, the club was initially "a bawdy assembly of younger artists and cognoscenti, which met weekly" and apparently held its meetings at the Rose and Crown

public house A pub (short for public house) is a kind of drinking establishment which is licensed to serve alcoholic drinks for consumption on the premises. The term ''public house'' first appeared in the United Kingdom in late 17th century, and was ...

. in addition to Vertue, members included Bernard Lens III, Christian Friedrich Zincke,

William Hogarth William Hogarth (; 10 November 1697 – 26 October 1764) was an English painter, engraver, pictorial satirist, social critic, editorial cartoonist and occasional writer on art. His work ranges from realistic portraiture to comic strip-like s ...

Peter Tillemans Peter Tillemans ( 1684 – 5 December 1734)Noakes, Aubrey, ''Sportsmen in a Landscape'' (Ayer Publishing, 1971, )pp. 47–56: ''Peter Tillemans and Early Newmarket''at books.google.com, accessed 7 February 2009. ONDB writes: "In 1733 Tillemans re ...

, Marcellus Laroon the Younger and

Michael Dahl Michael Dahl (1659–1743) was a Swedish portrait painter who lived and worked in England most of his career and died there. He was one of the most internationally known Swedish painters of his time. He painted portraits of many aristocrats and s ...

. The members of the club were known as the 'Rosacoronians'. An unfinished Hogarthian

conversation piece A conversation piece refers to a group portrait in a domestic or landscape setting depicting persons chatting or otherwise socializing with each other.Ashmolean Museum The Ashmolean Museum of Art and Archaeology () on Beaumont Street, Oxford, England, is Britain's first public museum. Its first building was erected in 1678–1683 to house the cabinet of curiosities that Elias Ashmole gave to the University of ...

attributed to the Scottish painter

Gawen Hamilton Gawen Hamilton (1698 – 1737), easily confused with the later, more prominent artist Gavin Hamilton (artist), Gavin Hamilton, was a Scottish painter working in London, a member of the Rose and Crown Club. He was one of the first wave of British b ...

(another member), ''An Assembly of Virtuosi'', shows a group of fifteen men, including eight who are identified in an etching of the painting by R. Cooper, published by W. B. Tiffin (1829), and it has been suggested that this is a group portrait of the Rosacoronians. The group includes Hamilton himself, Michael Dahl, John Vanderbank, the architect

William Kent William Kent (c. 1685 – 12 April 1748) was an English architect, landscape architect, painter and furniture designer of the early 18th century. He began his career as a painter, and became Principal Painter in Ordinary or court painter, but ...

, and

John Michael Rysbrack Johannes Michel or John Michael Rysbrack, original name Jan Michiel Rijsbrack, often referred to simply as Michael Rysbrack (24 June 1694 – 8 January 1770), was an 18th-century Flemish sculptor, who spent most of his career in England where h ...

the sculptor. Vertue listed the painter and engraver Gerhard Bockman as a member in 1724. The club was well connected with the older-established Virtuosi of St Luke (''c.'' 1689–1743), with which it is sometimes confused, although it was less prestigious. The Rose and Crown Club remained in existence until 1745 and held its last meeting at the Half-Moon Tavern.Whitley 1928, vol. 1, p. 70. Bignamini notes that

History

References

Further reading