Rowland Lockey (c. 1565–1616) was an English painter and

goldsmith A goldsmith is a metalworker who specializes in working with gold and other precious metals. Nowadays they mainly specialize in jewelry-making but historically, goldsmiths have also made silverware, platters, goblets, decorative and servicea ...

, and was the son of Leonard Lockey,Lewis, p. 8-9 a

crossbow A crossbow is a ranged weapon using an elastic launching device consisting of a bow-like assembly called a ''prod'', mounted horizontally on a main frame called a ''tiller'', which is hand-held in a similar fashion to the stock of a long fire ...

maker of the parish of St Bride's, Fleet Street, London. Lockey was

apprentice Apprenticeship is a system for training a new generation of practitioners of a trade or profession with on-the-job training and often some accompanying study (classroom work and reading). Apprenticeships can also enable practitioners to gain a ...

d to Queen Elizabeth's

miniaturist A portrait miniature is a miniature portrait painting, usually executed in gouache, watercolor, or enamel. Portrait miniatures developed out of the techniques of the miniatures in illuminated manuscripts, and were popular among 16th-century eli ...

and goldsmith

Nicholas Hilliard Nicholas Hilliard () was an English goldsmith and limner best known for his portrait miniatures of members of the courts of Elizabeth I and James I of England. He mostly painted small oval miniatures, but also some larger cabinet miniatures, ...

for eight years beginning

Michaelmas Michaelmas ( ; also known as the Feast of Saints Michael, Gabriel, and Raphael, the Feast of the Archangels, or the Feast of Saint Michael and All Angels) is a Christian festival observed in some Western liturgical calendars on 29 September, ...

1581 and was made a freeman or master of the

Worshipful Company of Goldsmiths The Worshipful Company of Goldsmiths, commonly known as the Goldsmiths' Company and formally titled The Wardens and Commonalty of the Mystery of Goldsmiths of the City of London, is one of the Great Twelve Livery Companies of the City of Lond ...

by 1600.Strong 1969, p. 255. He worked mainly as a copyist of earlier portraits to make up sets of oil paintings for the fashionable long galleries of great houses, but signed or documented portrait miniatures on

vellum Vellum is prepared animal skin or membrane, typically used as writing material. Parchment is another term for this material, from which vellum is sometimes distinguished, when it is made from calfskin, as opposed to that made from other anima ...

and a signed title page engraving for the 1602

Bishops' Bible The Bishops' Bible is an English translation of the Bible which was produced under the authority of the established Church of England in 1568. It was substantially revised in 1572, and the 1602 edition was prescribed as the base text for the King ...

also survive.Strong 1983, p. 136-140

Versions of Holbein's ''More family''

He is best known for his two near life-size copies from the early 1590s of ''The Family of Sir Thomas More'' (1527) by Hans Holbein the Younger. The original is now lost–it was destroyed by fire in the eighteenth century. Lockey's versions, which are at

Nostell Priory Nostell Priory is a Palladian house in Nostell, West Yorkshire, England, near Crofton on the road to Doncaster from Wakefield. It dates from 1733, and was built for the Winn family on the site of a medieval priory. The Priory and its contents ...

and the National Portrait Gallery in London, differ considerably, as the London version, ''Sir Thomas More, his father, his household and his descendants'', includes More's descendants in their contemporary dress but omits several of the figures in the Holbein original. This was painted around 1593, probably commissioned by

More More or Mores may refer to: Computing * MORE (application), outline software for Mac OS * more (command), a shell command * MORE protocol, a routing protocol * Missouri Research and Education Network Music Albums * ''More!'' (album), by Booka S ...

's grandson, Thomas More II, to commemorate five generations of the family. The four figures wearing ruffs and holding prayer books on the right are Thomas More II, his wife and their oldest and youngest sons. Anne More, née Cresacre (1511–77), was Sir Thomas's daughter-in-law, and appears twice: once copied from the Holbein as a young woman of about sixteen (between Sir Thomas and his father) and also as an older woman in the painting on the rear wall. A cabinet miniature version of this portrait c. 1594 with different details, also likely by Lockey, is in the

Victoria and Albert Museum The Victoria and Albert Museum (often abbreviated as the V&A) in London is the world's largest museum of applied arts, decorative arts and design, housing a permanent collection of over 2.27 million objects. It was founded in 1852 and nam ...

. There is also a surviving drawing by Holbein which confirms the general accuracy of the Nostell Priory version. Two further copies of the Holbein, at old

Chelsea Town Hall Chelsea Town Hall is a municipal building in King's Road, Chelsea, London. The oldest part is a Grade II* listed building and the later part is Grade II listed. History The building was commissioned to replace a mid-19th-century vestry hall on ...

and Hendred House, East Hendred, may be by Lockey, but are too damaged and over-painted for any certainty to be possible.

Other paintings

His signed portrait of Lady Margaret Beaufort, mother of Henry VII, based on a work by Meynnart Wewyck (Maynard Vewicke) was presented to St John's College, Cambridge in 1598, and a portrait of

King James I of England James VI and I (James Charles Stuart; 19 June 1566 – 27 March 1625) was King of Scotland as James VI from 24 July 1567 and King of England and Ireland as James I from the union of the Scottish and English crowns on 24 March 1603 until ...

as a young boy, now in the National Portrait Gallery, London, based on a 1574 painting by

Arnold Bronckorst Arnold Bronckhorst, or Bronckorst or Van Bronckhorst ( 1565–1583) was a Flemish or Dutch painter who was court painter to James VI of Scotland.Hardwick Hall Hardwick Hall in Derbyshire is an architecturally significant country house from the Elizabethan era, a leading example of the Elizabethan prodigy house. Built between 1590 and 1597 for Bess of Hardwick, it was designed by the architect ...

, working under the patronage of

Bess of Hardwick Elizabeth Cavendish, later Elizabeth Talbot, Countess of Shrewsbury ( Hardwick; c. 1527 13 February 1608), known as Bess of Hardwick, of Hardwick Hall, Derbyshire, was a notable figure of Elizabethan English society. By a series of well-made ...

between 1591 and 1597 and of her son Sir William Cavendish between 1608 and 1613. He produced around forty life-size pictures including copies of portraits of Cavendish's Elizabethan ancestors. The art historian Sir

Roy Strong Sir Roy Colin Strong, (born 23 August 1935) is an English art historian, museum curator, writer, broadcaster and landscape designer. He has served as director of both the National Portrait Gallery and the Victoria and Albert Museum in London. ...

has identified a number of inferior copies of Hilliard's portrait miniatures as probably the work of Lockey, pointing out their "weak and laboured brushstrokes" and "smudgy" features. Strong concludes that while Lockey was of "no significance as an artist" when compared to his brilliant fellow-apprentice to Hilliard

Isaac Oliver Isaac Oliver (c. 1565 – bur. 2 October 1617) or Olivier was an English portrait miniature painter.Baskett, John. ''Paul Mellon's legacy: a passion for British art'' (Yale University Press, 2007) pp. 240-1. Life and work Born in Rouen, ...

, his importance lies in carrying Hilliard's aesthetic into the next generation.

Artistic background

Lockey can be associated with Dutch or Flemish painters residing in London in the 1580s. One such painter, Peter Matheeusen in his 1588 will made bequests to his cousin

Adrian Vanson Adrian Vanson (died c. 1602) was court portrait painter to James VI of Scotland. Family and artistic background Adrian was probably born in Breda, the son of Willem Claesswen van Son by Kathelijn Adriaen Matheus de Blauwverversdochter. His uncle ...

, to the miniaturist

and to Rowland Lockey, including his library of manuals for painters.Edward Town, 'A Biographical Dictionary of London Painters 1547-1625' (Walpole Society, 2014), pp. 140-1, 183.

Notes

References

*Hearn, Karen, ed. (1995).''Dynasties: Painting in Tudor and Jacobean England 1530-1630''. New York, Rizzoli. . * * Strong, Roy (1969). ''The English Icon: Elizabethan and Jacobean Portraiture'', London, Routledge & Kegan Paul *Strong, Roy (983). ''The English Renaissance Miniature'', New York, Thames and Hudson,

External links