File:Portrait of George Grierson, of Rathfarnham House, Co. Dublin, in a blue jacket and white cravat (by Gilbert Stuart).jpg

English: Gilbert Stuart (1755-1825)

Portrait of George Grierson, of Rathfarnham House, Co. Dublin, half-length, in a blue jacket and white cravat

with an old handwritten label 'This portrait of our father George Grierson is the property of my brother George...painted by Stewart [sic] the American artist about 1795-6, Charlotte D.F. Grierson, 11th July 1866' (on the reverse of stretcher and frame)

oil on canvas

30 x 25 in. (76.2 x 63.5 cm.)

The sitter was educated at Trinity College, Dublin (between 1779 and 1784), before embarking on a successful career as a printer. He was the King's Printer in Ireland and is recorded as printer of the Dublin Gazette in 1800. He went into partnership with both John Rowe Porter and Martin Keene in 1814. Grierson married Charlotte, daughter of Thomas and Dorothea (née Forster) Thornton, of Greenville, Co. Cavan, at St. Thomas Church, Dublin in 1791. He was a keen sportsman and, as a member of the Heathfield Club, enjoyed the privilege of shooting on the Archbishop of Dublin's moors on Heathfield Mountain.

Gilbert Stuart, son of Gilbert Stuart, a native of Perth, Scotland, and Elizabeth, daughter of John Anthony, originally from Wales, was brought up in Nantucket, Rhode Island, but journeyed to Scotland in 1772 and London in 1775, before making his way to Dublin in 1789. While in London, Stuart worked in the studio of his fellow-countryman Benjamin West, R.A (1738-1820), before setting up his own studio in Berners Street and afterwards moving to New Burlington Street. He exhibited portraits at the Royal Academy between 1777 and 1785. On arriving in Dublin, Stuart was able to rely on his established reputation as a portraitist to secure a large practice and the patronage of many of the leading figures of the day. His sitters included members of the Irish House of Commons, most notably, the Lord Chancellor, John Fitzgibbon, Earl of Clare. Although he returned to America in 1793, working in New York, Philadelphia, Washington and Boston, Stuart maintained ties with Dublin, sending two portraits to an exhibition in the Parliament House in 1802.