(c.1747 - 91), painter; studied at Fournier's Academy 1764 and with Reynolds c.1764 - 6; exh. SA 1766 - 78, and RA 1782 - 6.
1771 - 8 Rome (1771?) [Lisbon, Apr. 1772] Naples (?), Florence (Aug. - Sep. 1772), Rome (Oct. 1772 - 1776 - ), Turin (May 1777), Genoa (by 20 Jun. 1778)
In 1771 Lord Arundell, having noticed one of Barron's portraits at the RA with an address 'at Rome', asked Father Thorpe in Rome who the artist was; Thorpe had no idea.1 Barron was in Lisbon in April 1772, when the British envoy Robert Walpole gave him a letter of introduction (dated 28 April 1772) to William Hamilton in Naples, describing him as 'a Scholar of Sir Joshua Reynolds for Painting and of Giardini for Musick ... Painting is his profession, and Musick is his Amusement'.2
In August and September 1772 Barron was copying in the Uffizi in Florence; at Horace Mann's request he was permitted to copy self-portraits and Raphael's St John in the Desert,3 but he was unable to copy Titian's Venus.4 Hayward gave the date of Barron's arrival in Rome as October 1772,5 and on 31 July 1773 Thomas Banks wrote that he had come 'at the beginning of the season': his great merit 'in the portrait way' and 'good correspondence' with society had led to so many commissions 'as proved no small mortification to [Wickstead]'; 'Barron is a young man of very conspicuous merit, has the most of Sir Joshua's fine manner of any of his pupils, and ... when he returns to England, he will cut a great figure in his way'.6 In 1774 Barron had so pleased the Duke of Cumberland 'with the fiddle' that the Duke 'honoured his abilities as a painter',7 but the picture is now unlocated. Barron was again in Rome in October 1775 and may have gone to Naples that winter.
In 1776 Barron was listed in Rome (with 'Pigionanti'[?]) in the Piazza di Spagna;8 in May 1777 he was in Genoa and Turin giving Northcote an introduction to Jacob More in Rome.9 Barron exhibited two portraits at the RA in 1778, giving his address as 'Rome'. On 20 June 1778 John Collet, the British consul at Genoa, mentioned that he had staying with him 'a Mr Barron, a very ingenious Artist & a most amiable young man.'10 The date of Barron's return to London is not known; he next exhibited at the RA in 1782 from King Street, London.
1. Thorpe letters MSS (25 May 1771). 2. Add.41197, f.185. 3. Borroni 1985, 41, 43. 4. SP 105/321, f.219 (27 Aug. 1772). 5. Hayward List, 14, 15, 17. 6. Bell, Banks, 16. 7. Thorpe letters MSS (6, 23* Apr. 1774). 8. AVR SA, S.Andrea delle Fratte. 9. Northcote, Memorials, 128, and Reynolds, 1:120. Whitley, 2:307. 10. Genoa cons.corr. MSS.