Joseph Barney

Joseph Barney (1753 in Wolverhampton – 13 April 1832 in London), was an English artist and engraver. He is usually described as a pupil of Antonio Zucchi and Angelica Kauffman and as a fruit and flower painter to the Prince Regent.

Two of his large-scale paintings — altar pieces The Deposition from the Cross (1781) and The Apparition of Our Lord to St Thomas (1784) have been preserved in Wolverhampton, and can be seen today at St John's church and at St Peter & St Paul's Roman Catholic church. During Barney's lifetime, his artistic achievements were respected and praised. In 1798, Stebbing Shaw, mentioning The Deposition from the Cross in his History of Staffordshire, called Barney a "native genius" of Wolverhampton. In the collection of Wolverhampton Art Gallery, there is a pen and ink drawing, A Blind Musician, which gives some additional idea of quality and versatility of Barney's works.

Wolverhampton archival materials and other local documents identify Joseph Barney as a son of Joseph Barney Snr., a local japanner, and, from 1780–1802, a partner of the Barney & Ryton, japanners. His mother was Eleanor, née Denholm. Being a son of a japanner, he received some artistic training and indeed started his artistic career painting flowers which were a popular decoration for japanned ware.

Barney came to London from Wolverhampton before or in 1774, as in that year he received from the Royal Society of Arts "a Silver Palette for a drawing of flowers". Barney indeed studied with Zucchi some time between c.1774 and 1780, as in 1777 he exhibited at the Society of Artists "at Mr Zucchi's, John Street, Adelphi". But the statement in the Dictionary of National Biography - "studied under the Italian decorative painter Antonio Zucchi (1726–1795) and Angelica Kauffman (1741–1807), exhibiting from their London address in 1777" must be challenged. Angelica Kauffman did not share the home with Zucchi, and lived at 16, Golden Square, chaperoned by her father. Barney must have known Angelica as a co-founder of the Academy of Art, an extremely popular and successful artist, and his mentor's future wife. He obviously was much influenced by her works, but so far, there is no documentary evidence of Barney being a pupil of Angelica Kauffman.

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