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Portrait Medal of John Smart

Delineator John Kirk (English, 1724 - 1778)
Modeler Joachim Smith (English, ca. 1737-1814)
Dateca. 1777
MediumBronze
DimensionsOverall: 1 7/16 × 1 7/16 inches (3.65 × 3.65 cm)
Credit LineGift of Mr. and Mrs. John W. Starr and the Starr Foundation, Inc.
Object numberF58-60/135
InscribedInscribed on recto, around the margin: "IOH:SMART. / PICT:EFFIG:MINUT: / SMITH·M·KIRK·F·"
On View
Not on view
Gallery Location
  • 128
Collections
DescriptionPortrait medal of a man in profile.Exhibition History
John Smart: Virtuoso in Miniature, The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City, MO, December 21, 2024–January 4, 2026, no cat., no. 1 under Legacy section.
Gallery Label

The medals (nos. 1 & 2) commissioned to honor John Smart’s years as vice president of the Society of Artists in Great Britain further demonstrate his artistic reputation, which he was keen to promote. Smart probably made the wax impression of his own profile from the medals (no. 3), demonstrating a lifelong fascination with his legacy, echoed in his numerous self-portraits. A century after Smart’s death, renewed demand for his work led to an increase in copies of his miniatures (no. 4).

Provenance

Mr. John W. (1905–2000) and Mrs. Martha Jane (1906–2011) Starr, Kansas City, MO, by 1958;

Their gift to The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City, MO, 1958.

Published References

Ross E. Taggart, ed., Handbook of the Collections in the William Rockhill Nelson Gallery of Art and Mary Atkins Museum of Fine Arts, 4th ed. (Kansas City, MO: William Rockhill Nelson Gallery of Art and Mary Atkins Museum of Fine Arts, 1959), 265, as Copper Medal Portrait of John Smart.

Ross E. Taggart, The Starr Collection of Miniatures (Kansas City, MO: William Rockhill Nelson Trust, 1971), unnumbered, p. 33, (repro.), as Medal of John Smart.

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