Robert Strange (engraver)

A Jacobite, he spent periods out of Great Britain, but was eventually reconciled to the Hanoverian succession and was knighted by George III.

[1] After the amnesty Strange went to London and, carrying with him the Prince's seal, which had been left behind in Scotland, to Rouen, a centre of exiled Jacobites.

[1] After a period of dealing in prints and working in London as engraver, Strange fell out with potential patrons at court, including Lord Bute.

Princess Augusta of Saxe-Gotha wished an engraving to be made of a portrait of Frederick, Prince of Wales, her late husband, by Allan Ramsay, and one of Bute.

[4] He encountered Richard Dalton on a mission to copy Italian artworks that overlapped with his own plans, and a future rival in Francesco Bartolozzi.

[2] Back in London, Strange exhibited pictures which he had collected, and prepared critical and descriptive catalogues.

In 1768, troubles in the Incorporated Society of Artists, of which Strange was a member, led to the foundation of the Royal Academy.

[1] Strange wished to engrave Anthony van Dyck's portrait of Queen Henrietta Maria, which belonged to George III.

Then he engraved West's picture of The Apotheosis of the Royal Children, finishing in 1786, and on 5 January 1787 was knighted by George III.

52 Great Queen Street, Lincoln's Inn Fields, on 5 July 1792, and was buried at St. Paul's, Covent Garden.

In London his engraved works included the Magdalen and Cleopatra of Guido Reni, and the Apollo and Marsyas of Andrea Sacchi.

Eighty sets of selected impressions of these were bound in atlas folio, with a dedication to the king (composed mainly by Blair), and published in 1790, with a portrait after Jean-Baptiste Greuze, and an introduction describing the progress of engraving.