The Blue Boy is an oil painting

Oil painting

Oil painting is the process of painting with pigments that are bound with a medium of drying oil—especially in early modern Europe, linseed oil. Often an oil such as linseed was boiled with a resin such as pine resin or even frankincense; these were called 'varnishes' and were prized for their body...

 by Thomas Gainsborough

Thomas Gainsborough

Thomas Gainsborough was an English portrait and landscape painter.-Suffolk:Thomas Gainsborough was born in Sudbury, Suffolk. He was the youngest son of John Gainsborough, a weaver and maker of woolen goods. At the age of thirteen he impressed his father with his penciling skills so that he let...

. Perhaps Gainsborough's most famous work, it is thought to be a portrait of Jonathan Buttall, the son of a wealthy hardware merchant, although this was never proved. It is an historical costume study as well as a portrait: the youth in his 17th-century apparel is regarded as Gainsborough's homage to Anthony Van Dyck

Anthony van Dyck

Sir Anthony van Dyck was a Flemish Baroque artist who became the leading court painter in England. He is most famous for his portraits of Charles I of England and his family and court, painted with a relaxed elegance that was to be the dominant influence on English portrait-painting for the next...

, and in particular is very close to Van Dyck's portrait of Charles II

Charles II of England

Charles II was monarch of the three kingdoms of England, Scotland, and Ireland.Charles II's father, King Charles I, was executed at Whitehall on 30 January 1649, at the climax of the English Civil War...

 as a boy.

Gainsborough had already painted something on the canvas before beginning The Blue Boy, which he painted over. The painting itself is on a fairly large canvas for a portrait, measuring 48 inches (121.9 cm) wide by 70 inches (177.8 cm) tall. The portrait now resides in the Huntington Library, San Marino, California

San Marino, California

San Marino is a small, affluent city in Los Angeles County, California. Incorporated in 1913, the City founders designed the community to be uniquely residential, with expansive properties surrounded by beautiful gardens, wide streets, and well maintained parkways...

.

Gainsborough painted the portrait in response to the advice of rival Joshua Reynolds

Joshua Reynolds

Sir Joshua Reynolds RA FRS FRSA was an influential 18th-century English painter, specialising in portraits and promoting the "Grand Style" in painting which depended on idealization of the imperfect. He was one of the founders and first President of the Royal Academy...

, who had written:

"It ought, in my opinion, to be indispensably observed, that the masses of light in a picture be always of a warm, mellow colour, yellow, red, or the green colours be kept almost entirely out of these masses, and be used only to support or set off these warm colours; and for this purpose, a small proportion of cold colour will be sufficient. Let this conduct be reversed: let the light be cold, and the surrounding colour warm, as we often see in the works of the Roman and Florentine painters, and it will be out of the power of art, even in the hands of Rubens and Titian, to make a picture splendid and harmonious."

The painting was in Jonathan Buttall's possession until he filed for bankruptcy in 1796. It was bought first by the politician John Nesbitt and then, in 1802, by the portrait painter John Hoppner

John Hoppner

John Hoppner was an English portrait painter, .-Early life:Hoppner was born in Whitechapel, London, the son of German parents - his mother was one of the German attendants at the royal palace. King George's fatherly interest and patronage of the young boy gave rise to rumours, quite unfounded,...

. In about 1809 The Blue Boy entered the collection of the Earl Grosvenor

Robert Grosvenor, 1st Marquess of Westminster

Robert Grosvenor, 1st Marquess of Westminster, KG was the son of the 1st Earl Grosvenor, whom he succeeded in 1802 as 2nd Earl Grosvenor. He was created Marquess of Westminster in 1831. He was an English Member of Parliament and an ancestor of the modern day Dukes of Westminster...

 and remained with his descendants until its sale by the second Duke of Westminster

Hugh Grosvenor, 2nd Duke of Westminster

Hugh Richard Arthur Grosvenor, 2nd Duke of Westminster GCVO DSO was the son of Victor Alexander Grosvenor, Earl Grosvenor and Lady Sibell Mary Lumley, the daughter of the 9th Earl of Scarborough...

 to the dealer Joseph Duveen in 1921.

In 1919 the painting had inspired German film producer Friedrich Wilhelm Murnau

Friedrich Wilhelm Murnau

Friedrich Wilhelm "F. W." Murnau was one of the most influential German film directors of the silent era, and a prominent figure in the expressionist movement in German cinema during the 1920s...

 to create his debut film (The Boy in Blue).

In a move that caused a public outcry in Britain, it was then sold to the American railway pioneer Henry Edwards Huntington for $728,800 (£182,200), according to dealer Duveen's bill, a then-record price for any painting. (According to a mention in The New York Times

The New York Times

The New York Times is an American daily newspaper founded and continuously published in New York City since 1851. The New York Times has won 106 Pulitzer Prizes, the most of any news organization...

, dated November 11, 1921, the purchase price was $640,000, which would be over $7.75 million in 2010.) Before its departure to California

California

California is a state located on the West Coast of the United States. It is by far the most populous U.S. state, and the third-largest by land area...

 in 1922, The Blue Boy was briefly put on display at the National Gallery

National Gallery, London

The National Gallery is an art museum on Trafalgar Square, London, United Kingdom. Founded in 1824, it houses a collection of over 2,300 paintings dating from the mid-13th century to 1900. The gallery is an exempt charity, and a non-departmental public body of the Department for Culture, Media...

 where it was seen by 90,000 people; the Gallery's director Charles Holmes

Charles Holmes

Sir Charles John Holmes, KCVO was a British painter, art critic and museum director. His writing on art combined theory with practice and he was an expert on the painting techniques of the Old Masters, from whose example he had learned to draw and paint.Holmes was the son of a clergyman, Charles...

 was moved to scrawl farewell words on the back of the painting: "Au Revoir, C.H.".

It was this painting that moved pop artist Robert Rauschenberg

Robert Rauschenberg

Robert Rauschenberg was an American artist who came to prominence in the 1950s transition from Abstract Expressionism to Pop Art. Rauschenberg is well-known for his "Combines" of the 1950s, in which non-traditional materials and objects were employed in innovative combinations...

 toward painting. It is often paired with a painting by Thomas Lawrence

Thomas Lawrence (painter)

Sir Thomas Lawrence RA FRS was a leading English portrait painter and president of the Royal Academy.Lawrence was a child prodigy. He was born in Bristol and began drawing in Devizes, where his father was an innkeeper. At the age of ten, having moved to Bath, he was supporting his family with his...

 called Pinkie

Pinkie (Lawrence painting)

Pinkie is the traditional title for a portrait of 1794 by Thomas Lawrence in the permanent collection of The Huntington at San Marino, California where it hangs opposite The Blue Boy by Thomas Gainsborough. These two works are the centerpieces of the institute's art collection, which specializes in...

which sits opposite to it at the Huntington Library.