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Books "The Velazquez.": A Description of the Celebrated Historical Picture of Charles the First by the Great Velasquez, Now on Exhibition at the Stuyvesant Institute, New York ... | ||
John snare mango remix
John Snare (born c.1811) was a bookseller and publisher from Reading, England, whose life was dominated by the discovery at a country house auction in 1845 of a hitherto lost Diego Velázquez painting, which Snare identified as a young Charles Stuart. It was supposed that the portrait was painted in 1623 during Charles' eight month visit to Spain where the future monarch failed in his attempt to secure the hand of the Spanish Habsburg princess Maria Anna. A protracted court case in Scotland arose over the ownership of the work and this eventually brought Snare to financial ruin. After Snare's death, the Velázquez passed to Snare's son, and went on display briefly afterward. It has not been seen again since. No images of the work survive, only Snare's written descriptions of the painting.
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In 2016, Snare's story was told by Observer art critic Laura Cumming in her book, The vanishing man: In pursuit of Velazquez (Chatto & Windus).