Opie, John

Opie, John, 1761–1807, English portrait and historical painter. Opie showed a remarkable talent as a young man. He became the protégé of the poet John Wolcot, and enjoyed a brief popularity as a fashionable portrait painter in the Reynolds tradition. In 1786 he began a series of seven pictures for Boydell's Shakespeare Gallery. His portrait of Mary Wollstonecraft is in the National Portrait Gallery, London.

The Columbia Electronic Encyclopedia, 6th ed. Copyright © 2007, Columbia University Press. All rights reserved.

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