(Thomas) James Northcote

Painter, born in Plymouth, Devon, SW England, UK. A pupil and assistant of Reynolds, he painted portraits and historical pictures, among them the well-known ‘Princes in the Tower’ and ‘Prince Arthur and Hubert’. He is also remembered by Hazlitt's Conversations with Northcote.

James Northcote (October 22, 1746 - July 13, 1831), was an English painter.

In 1775 he left Reynolds, and about two years later, having made some money by portrait painting back in Devon, he went to study in Italy. and shortly afterwards Northcote began a set of ten subjects, entitled "The Modest Girl and the Wanton", which were completed and engraved in 1796. Among the productions of Northcote's later years are the "Entombment" and the "Agony in the Garden," besides many portraits, and several animal subjects, such as "Leopards", "Dog and Heron", and "Lion"; these were more successful than the artist's efforts in the higher departments of art, as was indicated by Fuseli's caustic remark on examining the "Angel opposing Balaam" --"Northcote, you are an angel at an ass, but an ass at an angel." Northcote's works number about two thousand, and he made a fortune of £40,000.

Northcote also sought fame as an author, and his first essays were contributions to the Artist, edited by Prince Hoare. His Fables--the first series published in 1828, the second posthumously in 1833--were illustrated with woodcuts by Harvey from Northcote's own designs. In the production of his Life of Titian, his last work, which appeared in 1830, he was assisted by William Hazlitt, who previously, in 1826, had given to the public in the New Monthly Magazine his recollections of Northcote's pungent and cynical "conversations", causing some problems for the painter and his friends.

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This article incorporates text from the Encyclopædia Britannica Eleventh Edition, a publication now in the public domain.