(1755 - 1834), painter and dramatist, 2nd s. of William Hoare, the pastellist; studied under his fa. and RA schools 1773; exh. FS and RA 1781 - 5; to Lisbon 1788; FSA.
1776 - 9 Florence (by 2 Nov. 1776), Rome (Nov. 1776 - Easter 1779), Naples (Apr. 1779), Rome ( - Jun. 1779), Florence (by 11 Jul. - Aug. - ), Parma (two months), Modena, Venice (winter 1779 - Mar. 1780), Padua, Verona, Mantua [England 2 May 1780]
B.R. Haydon was to describe Prince Hoare as the son of 'a bad painter at Bath, who, having as high opinion of Prince's genius, sent him with a valet to Italy to get what nature had denied him, in the Capella Sistina. He went through the whole routine of labouring for natural talents by copying Michael Angelo, copying Raffaele, copying Titian; came home to be the rival of Reynolds, [but] found his own talents in art were of the feeblest order'.1 Hoare was copying in the Uffizi in November 1776,2 but by 23 November 1776 he had arrived in Rome,3 where he was said to have studied under Mengs. Thomas Jones met him on 18 May 1777 with Hewetson in Thomas Jenkins's villa at Castel Gandolfo,4 and he was staying in the Strada Felice in 1778 and 1779.5 He met Fuseli and was friendly with Ozias Humphry (although they were rivals for the affection of Maria Hadfield),6 but his principal companion in Italy was James Northcote, who described him as 'a very genteel young man' who studied painting 'though he has an independent fortune of two or three hundred a year. I went to him because Sir Joshua advised me to cultivate acquaintance with him sooner than with any other Sir Joshua knew in Rome'.7
A sketch-book by Hoare (VAM) contains drawings after antique sculpture in the manner of Fuseli, but of his paintings there are only the two self-portraits in the Uffizi, and Father Thorpe's comment of October 1777 that he had seen some 'cleverly painted heads' by him.8 Hoare paid a brief visit to Naples in April 1779 with a party which included Northcote, Maria Hadfield, Thomas Banks and Henry Tresham. In June he left Rome for England with Northcote; they spent three months in Florence where Hoare was again copying in the Uffizi,9 and two in Parma, before wintering in Venice (where he painted one of his self-portraits in the Uffizi). After his return to England Hoare was elected to the Florentine Academy on 22 April 1781.(10)
1. Northcote Memorials, 158. 2. Borroni 1985, 60. Gazz.Tosc. (2 Nov. 1776). 3. Thorpe letters MSS (23 Nov. 1776). 4. Jones Memoirs, 59. 5. AVR sa, S.Andrea delle Fratte. 6. Fuseli Circle, 96. 7. Whitley, 2:307 - 8 (letters to his brother, 24 May and 22 Dec. 1777). 8. Thorpe letters MSS (28 Oct. 1777*). 9. Borroni 1985, 60: 1991, 258. 10. Wynne 1990, 537.