Featured Help dating Engraving Rinaldo and Armida

The original painting attributed to Angelica Cauffman
Swiss neoclassical painter 1741-1807.
This oval is 10" x 13" with the frame is 15 1/2" x 19"
My initial thoughts were late 19th century on the print and frame?
Mikey

 

It may help the search if you spell it Kauffmann.

 

Yes her name comes up using her given name and with the American spelling.
Thanks for looking @Any Jewelry

 

I'd think early 20th century. 10s, 20s.

Debora

 

I have only seen the C/K substitution with Angelika/Angelica, not Kauffmann/Cauffmann.

 

So have I. And Angelica with a c was because she lived in England, not in America.

 

deleted

 

I sometimes use the term American when only English should be used. Maybe my California upbringing lol.

 

https://books.google.ca/books?id=Mh...homas burke" engraving rinaldo armida&f=false

 

That's it. Exactly the same measurements.

 

I tend to agree with this, I have a framed print that belonged to my grandmother. Found after she died, no one remembered seeing it in the home she had with my grandfather, so probably something she had before her marriage in 1925.

It is in a similar vein, a depiction of a scene originating in Italian literature of earlier centuries. Keats took the story of Isabella from the Decameron. The painting, by John White Alexander, depicts Isabella with the pot of basil that hides the head of her murdered lover.

 

Evidently she painted the scene more than once. This looks to be the original for the engraving:

https://artuk.org/discover/artworks/rinaldo-and-armida-191776#

 

This is Kauffmann as a cameo, from a self portrait. She has styled herself as a sibyl, representing Hope.

 

I wasn't going to open it up but curiosity got to me.
As i expected Angelica Kauffman, Spelled with a K as @Any Jewelry corrected me.
But what i didn't expect is the engraver being F Burke instead of Thomas Burke.
I only found one article for an F Burke who died in 1800?
@Bronwen and @Debora your thoughts on this?

 

As you found, the engraver F. Burke seems to be quite obscure:

https://books.google.com/books?id=05C02RhJZCkC&pg=PA188&lpg=PA188&dq=engraver+f+burke&source=bl&ots=QMmmd_dKf0&sig=ACfU3U3o08g7VSwEv5Esrc2LodEKwDXZog&hl=en&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwjW0ZXH78X0AhWvkYkEHTXmDW0Q6AF6BAgYEAM#v=onepage&q=engraver f burke&f=false

But Thomas is not the only engraver named Burke. Your print does not necessarily date to F. Burke's life span.

 

That's what I found. Lol

 

I think you can still say Thomas Burke, though you will have to point out that initial "F". You have the one source there that says Thomas, and the print is mentioned in Julia Frankau's "Eighteenth Century Colour Prints".

That book compares Burke to Bartolozzi and states "...Angelica Kaufmann has left it on record that she preferred his translation of her pictures to that of the popular Florentine." (No idea what record that would be.)

No picture in this book of the print, but it is described as the moment when "...the two knights ... find him in the arms of his enchantress."

The book does not mention an initial "F", but does mention a spelling error in Angelica's name (a missing "n") on one state of another Burke engraving of a Kaufmann subject.

This may be a spelling mistake unique to one state of the print. It could happen: the text on these prints was the work of third party specialists.

The reference you found to F. Burke mentions "an engraving after George Stubbs" ... one engraving. Search Thomas Burke and you will find one engraving of a Stubbs subject. The best image I could find online looks like the name is "T. Burke", but it's unclear, and this could be the same situation - a mistake in a particular state of the print.

It's also possible that F. Burke is a different person entirely, but he's a pretty accomplished engraver for someone essentially unknown at a time when good engravers were recognized as such.

 

How could it not be done in Burkes lifespan?

 

You better run that timeline by me. Prints can be produced long after the original artist and engraver are gone. Plates are durable. I have one engraving produced in the last 40 years from a plate that was 250 years old.

 

Understood! Thank you @moreotherstuff for all of this information. I didn't know about the print mention in your book. That's Awesome!