Kanffmann

Kanffmann, ANGELICA, painter, was born 30th October 1741 at Coire in the Grisons, Switzerland. Whilst still a child she painted the portraits of notabilities in Italy, and in Rome fell under the good influence of Winckelmann. In 1766 Lady Wentworth, wife of the British resident in Venice, persuaded her to go to London. There she soon became famous as a painter of classic and mythological pictures, and as a portrait-painter. She was befriended by Reynolds, and was nominated one of the very first batch of Royal Academicians. But her life was for a while embittered by a marriage (1767) into which she had been tricked by a mere adventurer. It cost her a large part of her fortune to get the marriage dissolved. In 1781 she married the Italian painter Zucchi (1729-95), and, returning to Rome, lived for her art in a circle of distinguished artists, poets, and scholars. She died 5th November 1807. Her numerous paintings are well known from engravings by Bartolozzi and others. As a painter she fails to attain to the first rank. Grace and harmonious colouring do not atone for faulty drawing and lack of originality. Angelica was also an accomplished singer. Her beauty and talents were sung by such poets as Goldsmith, Klopstock, and Gessner, and her story has in recent times furnished a theme to Miss Thackeray. See Wessely's Life of her in Dohme's Kunst und Künstler (1877); Dublin Univ. Mag., 1873; Art Journal, 1890; and the Life by F. A. Gerard (1892).