Isaac Oliver (c. 1565-1617), Anne of Denmark (detail), c. 1612, Purchased with help from the Art Fund, 1957 © National Portrait Gallery, London.

LONDON.- The National Portrait Gallery, London is to stage the first major exhibition devoted to Tudor and Jacobean portrait miniatures for over 35 years. 

The exhibition will bring together key works from the National Portrait Gallery and major loans from public and private collections, including miniatures that haven’t been seen in public in the UK since the early 1980s, to showcase the careers of the most skilled artists of the period, Nicholas Hilliard (1547? – 1619) and French born Isaac Oliver (c.1565 – 1617). 

In the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, miniature painting was regarded as an art form at which the English excelled above all others, and Hilliard and Oliver gained international fame and admiration. The exhibition will explore what these exquisite images reveal about identity, society and visual culture in Elizabethan and Jacobean England. Termed ‘limnings’ at the time, with their roots in manuscript illumination, miniatures were prized by monarchs, courtiers and the rising middle classes as a means of demonstrating favour, showing loyalty and expressing close relationships. They could be set into ornate jewelled cases and worn around the neck, pinned to clothing or secretly concealed as part of elaborate processes of friendship, love, patronage and diplomacy. 

Described by Hilliard as ‘a thing apart from all other painting or drawing’, miniature painting was regarded as a particularly refined and expressive art form, capturing, in the words of Hilliard, ‘these lovely graces, witty smilings, and these stolen glances which suddenly like lightning pass’, as well as the rich and elaborate costumes and jewellery of the time. These tiny portraits, many in exceptional condition, bring their sitters before us, four hundred years after they were painted, with astonishing freshness and vivacity. In the words of a later commentator, ‘The art of the master and the imitation of nature are so great ... that the largest magnifying glass only calls out new beauties.’ 

A large section of the exhibition will be devoted to Hilliard and Oliver’s portraits of Elizabeth I, as well as images of James I, his wife Anne of Denmark and his three children Henry, Elizabeth and Charles (later Charles I). Miniatures of some of the most famous figures of the day, including Sir Walter Ralegh and Sir Francis Drake, will be displayed along with some of the most evocative and well-known works of the period, including the beautiful Young Man among Roses by Hilliard and Hilliard’s Unknown Man against a Background of Flames, both on loan from the V&A. 

Nicholas Hilliard (1547?-1619), Queen Elizabeth I, 1572, Purchased, 1860 © National Portrait Gallery, London.

Isaac Oliver (c. 1565-1617), Anne of Denmark, c. 1612, Purchased with help from the Art Fund, 1957 © National Portrait Gallery, London.

Nicholas Hilliard (1547?-1619), Sir Walter Ralegh, c.1585. © National Portrait Gallery, London.

Nicolas Hilliard (1547?-1619), 'Young Man Among Roses', c.1587. © Granger Historical Picture Archive/Alamy Stock Photo/Alamy

Nicholas Hilliard (1547?-1619), Portrait of an unknown man against a background of flames. © Clare Johnson/Victoria and Albert Museum, London.

Catharine MacLeod, Senior Curator of Seventeenth-Century Portraits and Curator of Elizabethan Treasures: Miniatures by Hilliard and Oliver says: “I am thrilled to be able to bring together the miniature masterpieces of Nicholas Hilliard and Isaac Oliver in this major new exhibition. In addition to exploring the exquisite technique of the artists, portrait miniatures from this period express in a unique way many of the most distinctive and fascinating aspects of court life in this period: ostentatious secrecy, games of courtly love, arcane symbolism, a love of intricacy and decoration.” 

Elizabethan Treasures: Miniatures by Hilliard and Oliver is curated by Catharine MacLeod, Senior Curator, Seventeenth-Century Portraits, National Portrait Gallery, London.

21 February - 19 May 2019

Nicholas Hilliard (1547?-1619), Francis Bacon, later Baron Verulam and Viscount St Alban, 1576. © National Portrait Gallery, London. 

Nicholas Hilliard (1547?-1619), Self-Portrait, 1577. © Victoria and Albert Museum, London.

Isaac Oliver (c. 1565-1617), Self-portrait, c. 1590. © National Portrait Gallery, London.

Isaac Oliver (c. 1565-1617), Unknown Woman Wearing a Hat, c 1600. © National Portrait Gallery, London. 

Isaac Oliver (c. 1565-1617), The Browne Brothers, 1598. © Burghley House Collections, Burghley House, Stamford, Lincolnshire

Isaac Oliver (c. 1565-1617), Young Man Seated Under a Tree. © National Portrait Gallery, London.

Isaac Oliver (c. 1565-1617), A Party in the Open Air. Allegory on Conjugal Love, 1590-95. © Statens Museum for Kunst - National Gallery of Denmark.