Smith, James
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- Smith, James
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(b. c.1749 - after 1797), American painter, known as 'Smith of Parma'.
[1767 Rome]
1774 - 80 Rome (by Easter 1774 - Easter 1776), Parma (by 23 Sep. - 19 Nov. 1776, by May 1777), Florence (by Oct. 1777, by Aug. 1778), Rome (by 1 Dec. 1778 - 31 May 1780) [England]
1781 - 7 Florence (Oct. 1781); Vicenza (30 May 1787), Florence (Nov. 1787)
1789 - 97 Rome (1789 - 93), Venice (15 Sep. 1794), Florence (Sep. 1794; 1796 - 7)
'Smith of Parma' spent some twenty years in Italy in the course of three or four visits, during which he was principally engaged as a copyist. He may have been the 'James Smith, portrait painter' who arrived in Rome in 1767,1 but he is otherwise first recorded in Rome at Easter 1774 living by the Via Babuino ('Giacomo Smit Inglese Protestante Pittore - 24') and he was listed at the same address in 1775 and 1776.2 In June 1775 he was completing three copies for Patrick Home: Guido Reni's Fortune and Guercino's Persian Sybil from the Capitol and Caravaggio's Gamesters from the Palazzo Barberini.3 James Smith was given official permission to copy Correggio's S.Jerome in the gallery at Parma on 23 September 1776.4 He wrote to Ozias Humphry concerning his progress on 19 November,5 and the following year Patrick Home saw him with his full-size copy in May, 'succeeding tolerably'.2 On 14 November 1776 Thomas Jones had met in Parma 'Mr Smith an Artist and Native of N. America, whom I afterwards knew in Rome by the name of Smith of Parma to distinguish him from others of the same name'.6 Two copies by Mr Smith, almost certainly James Smith, made in Italy in 1777 for Henry Blundell (Raphael's Madonna delle sedia and Correggio's Madonna with S.Catherine) were sold in 1991 (Christie's, 19 Apr.). He was in Florence in October 1777 copying Correggio's Madonna in the Uffizi, and he was again copying there in August 1778 (Michaelangelo's Self portrait).7 On 31 May 1780 Jones said Smith left Rome for England.8
In October 1781 Smith was once more copying in the Uffizi (Raphael prints) and again in November 1787 (Titian, Venus of Urbino).9
Thomas Jones said that Smith later returned to Rome,6 and he was doubtless the 'Giacomo Smith Inglese Pitte.' (whose age was given as 40 in 1789) living in Rome in the Strada Felice with the architect Samuel Bunce in 1789 - 91 and with the architect William Theed in 1792.(10) 'Smith History Painter' was listed on the Trinit? de'Monte in 1790 and 1793 (Rome Lists), but there was also an English painter Charles Smith living in Rome at Easter 1790 (see above). 'Smith', evidently an artist, was mentioned in Rome by James Irvine in April 1791 as dining with and ridiculing Guy Head,11 and 'Smith' is mentioned in Mrs Flaxman's Diary in February and March 1791.(12)
On 15 September 1794, 'James Smith, peintre, citoyen de l'Am?rique septentrionale' signed (with Duvivier) a letter from Venice addressed to Cacault, the French Republican charg? d'affaires in Italy, seeking the release of Archibald Skirving, whom the French had captured at sea (see Skirving). In September 1794 Smith had also been in Florence, said to be about to return to America, but he was again in Florence in 1796 - 7, copying Flemish paintings.(13) He was possibly the Smith, 'the American, an ennuyeux', who went from Rome to Naples with Lady Webster in March 1796,14 though this could equally have been Allen Smith.
1. Hayward List, 13. 2. AVR sa, S.Maria del Popolo. 3. Home jnl.MSS. 4. ASPR, Accademia delle belle arti, carteggio. 5. Humphry corr.MSS, hu/2/46. 6. Jones Memoirs, 49. 7.
Borroni 1985:64; 1987:108, 125. 8. Jones Memoirs, 72. 9. Borroni 1985:64; 1987:132, 147. 10. AVR sa, S.Andrea delle Fratte. 11. Add.36496, f.307 (8 Apr. 1791). 12. Mrs Flaxman jnl.MSS 2. 13. Borroni 1984:45; 1991:267. 14. Holland Jnl., 1:142.