1778 in art

Events

• 24 April – The Royal Academy Exhibition of 1778 opens at Pall Mall in London
• December – The artistic cargo of the British ship Westmorland, seized by the French, is acquired by Spanish interests.
• Nicholas Pocock gives up his career as a seaman and devotes himself to painting.

Paintings

• John Singleton Copley – Watson and the Shark
• Thomas Gainsborough
  • Portrait of Philip James de Loutherbourg
  • Portrait of James Christie
• Francisco Goya – Children With a Cart
• William Hodges – Ludlow Castle, Shropshire
• Jean-Antoine Houdon – Portrait busts of Rousseau and Voltaire
• Angelica Kauffman – Zeuxis Selecting Models for His Painting of Helen of Troy
• Élisabeth Vigée Le Brun – Portrait of Joseph Vernet
• David Martin – Dido Elizabeth Belle and Lady Elizabeth Murray
• John Hamilton Mortimer – Sir Arthegal, the Knight of Justice, with Talus, the Iron Man (from Spenser’s ‘Faerie Queene’)
• Sir Joshua Reynolds
  • Jane, Countess of Harrington
  • Lady Caroline Howard
  • Captain John Hayes St Leger
• Joshua Reynolds – The Marlborough Family
• George Romney – Jane Gordon, Duchess of Gordon, and Her Son, George Gordon
• Richard Samuel – Portraits in the Characters of the Muses in the Temple of Apollo
• Gilbert Stuart – Self-portrait
• Henry Walton – A Girl Buying a Ballad
• Benjamin West
  • The Battle of the Boyne
  • The Battle of La Hogue
• Johann Zoffany – Tribuna of the Uffizi (completed)

Births

• January 1 – Charles Alexandre Lesueur, artist and explorer (died 1846)
• February 22
  • Franz Ludwig Catel, German artist (died 1856)
  • Rembrandt Peale, American artist (died 1860)
• May 31 – John Jackson, English portrait painter (died 1831)
• June 7 – Beau Brummell, leader of fashion (died 1840)
• June 10
  • Cornelis Cels, Belgian painter of portraits and historical subjects (died 1859)
  • Joseph Willibrord Mähler, German portrait painter (died 1860)
• June 15 – Henri Jean-Baptiste Victoire Fradelle, Franco-English painter (died 1865)
• August 4 – Christian Duttenhofer, German engraver (died 1843)
• August 11 – John Christian Schetky, Scottish-born marine painter (died 1874)
• August 17
  • Johannes Hermanus Koekkoek, Dutch painter (died 1851)
  • John Varley, English watercolour painter and astrologer (died 1842)
  • Johannes Hermanus Koekkoek, Dutch painter and draughtsman (died 1851)
• August 31 – Friedrich August von Klinkowström, German artist, author and teacher (died 1835)
• September 1 – Reverend John Thomson, minister of Duddingston Kirk and Landscape artist (died 1840)
• October 5 – John James Masquerier, British portrait artist (died 1855)
• date unknown
  • Allen Robert Branston, English wood-engraver (died 1827)
  • Wilhelmina Krafft, Swedish painter and portrait miniaturist (died 1828)
  • Nukina Kaioku, Japanese painter and calligrapher (died 1863)
  • Tang Yifen, Chinese landscape painter and calligrapher during the Qing Dynasty (died 1853)

Deaths

• January 4 - Charles-Dominique-Joseph Eisen, French painter and draftsman (born 1720)
• February 19 – Nathan Drake, English painter (born c.1728)
• February 24 – Laurent Delvaux, French sculptor (born 1696)
• March – Thomas Roberts, Irish landscape painter (born 1748)
• March 6 – Gaudenzio Botti, Italian painter, mainly active in Brescia (born 1698)
• May 20 – Gaetano Zompini, Italian printmaker and engraver (born 1700)
• May 25 – Jean-Baptiste Lemoyne, French sculptor (born 1704)
• September 11 – Johann Sebastian Bach, German painter and grandson of the composer (born 1748)
• September 28 – Jean Girardet, French painter of portrait miniatures (born 1709)
• October 2 – Françoise Duparc, Spanish born Baroque painter who later lived in France (born 1726)
• November 9 – Giovanni Battista Piranesi, Italian artist (born 1720)
• December 15 - Catherine Read, Scottish portrait-painter (born 1723)
• December 22 – Simon Mathurin Lantara, French landscape painter (born 1729)
• date unknown
  • John Cobb, English cabinetmaker (born 1710)
  • Ignazio Hugford, or Ignatius Heckford, Florentine painter (born 1703)
  • Wojciech Rojowski, Polish sculptor and woodcarver (born unknown)
  • Pieter Vanderlyn, American colonial painter (born 1687)

References

References

1. Griñán, F. (September 2024). "Treasures from British ship return to Malaga after more than 200 years".
2. Moyle, Franny. ''Mrs Kauffman and Madame Le Brun: The Entwined Lives of Two Great Eighteenth-Century Women Artists''. Bloomsbury Publishing, 2025. p.210-11
3. Gita May. (2008). "Elisabeth Vigee Le Brun: The Odyssey of an Artist in an Age of Revolution". Yale University Press.
4. Jeffries, Stuart. (2014-05-27). "Dido Belle: the artworld enigma who inspired a movie". The Guardian.
5. "Lady Caroline Howard".
6. (1913). "Cyclopedia of Painters and Paintings". C. Scribner's sons.
7. (1985). "Rembrandt Peale, 1778-1860, a Life in the Arts: An Exhibition at The Historical Society of Pennsylvania, February 22, 1985 to June 28, 1985". Historical Society of Pennsylvania.
8. Allan Cunningham. (1880). "The Lives of the Most Eminent British Painters". George Bell.
9. John Denison Champlin. (1927). "Cyclopedia of Painters and Paintings". Empire State Book Company.
10. {{ÖBL. 5. 404. 404. Mähler, Joseph Willibrord. Wacha {{in lang. de
11. (1984). "John Varley, 1778-1842". B.T. Batsford.
12. Philip Gilbert Hamerton. (1887). "The Portfolio: An Artistic Periodical". Seeley.
13. Samuel Redgrave. (1874). "A Dictionary of Artists of the English School: Painters, Sculptors, Architects, Engravers and Ornamentists". Longmans, Green and Company.
14. (1997). "Avery's Choice: Five Centuries of Great Architectural Books : One Hundred Years of an Architectural Library, 1890-1990". G.K. Hall.
15. Benjamin Burges Moore. (1962). "Giovanni Battista Piranesi".
16. (1959). "The Illustrated London News". William Little.
17. (1891). "DNB". Smith, Elder, & Company.
18. (1959). "Antiques". Straight Enterprises.