Mary Beale (née Cradock; Suffolk, March 26, 1633 - Pall Mall, October 8, 1699) was an English woman painter who was among the most successful professional portrait painters of the Baroque era in the late 18th century, thanks to her perseverance in her work.
Praised by Richard Gibson and court painter Peter Lely, she is considered on par with Joan Carlile, another English portrait painter, who was one of the first women to practice painting professionally.
Mary Beale managed to support her family financially through her work as a professional portrait painter. Her book Observations (Remarks), although never officially published, was one of the first educational books ever written by a woman, and swaggeringly announced her authority on painting.
Mary Beale stood out among the women of her era because of her outspokenness and the success of her work, which enabled her to be the support of her family.
Mary Beale's Biography
Mary Cradock was born in Suffolk, England, in late March. She was baptized on March 26, 1633, by her father John Cradock in the rectory of St. Paul's Church in Barrow (Suffolk). Her mother was Dorothy; her maiden name is illegible on her marriage certificate to John Cradock.
Aside from being a rector, John Cradock was also an amateur painter, who may have taught Mary to paint. Growing up Barrow, Mary lived near Bury St Edmunds, where a group of painters worked, including Peter Lely and Matthew Snelling, whom Mary may have met in her youth.
On August 23, 1643, John and Dorothy Cradock gave birth to a son named John. Dorothy died not long after the birth.
During the Civil War, John Cradock appointed Walter Cradock, a distant cousin of his, as guardian of his children John and Mary.
Mary Cradock met Charles Beale (1632-1705), a cloth merchant who was also an amateur painter, during a visit to the Heighams of Wickhambrook, who were related to the Yelverton and Beale families. Charles Beale wrote her a passionate love letter and poem on July 25 of an unknown year.
Mary Cradock married Charles Beale on March 8, 1651 at the age of eighteen. Her father, John Cradock, was seriously ill at the time and died a few days after Mary's marriage. The couple moved to Walton-on-Thames at some later time. Charles Beale was a civil clerk at the time, but eventually became Mary's studio administrator once she became a professional painter.
At one point, Charles was working for the Board of Green Cloth, a group of officials in charge of controlling the accounts of the Royal Household and arranging royal travel) where he mixed color pigments. In about 1660-64 the family moved to Albrook (now Allbrook), Otterbourne, Hampshire, to escape the plague.
Throughout their marriage, Mary and Charles worked together as equals and as business partners, which was not often seen at the time. Charles and Mary's eldest son, Bartholomew, was buried on October 18, 1654. Little else is known about him.
Their second son was baptized on February 14, 1655 and also named. Their third son Charles was born in 1660.
A professional businesswoman
Mary Beale preferred to paint with oil and water colors; whenever she drew a picture, she used wax crayons. Peter Lely, who succeeded Anthony van Dyck as court painter, took great interest in Mary's progress as an artist, especially since she practiced imitating some of his work.
Mary Beale began to paint for people she knew in exchange for small gifts or favors. Charles Beale kept careful records of everything Mary did as an artist. He took notes on how she painted, what business transactions took place, who came to visit, and what praise she received.
Charles wrote thirty notebooks of observations over the years, calling Mary "my dearest heart." She became a semi-professional portrait painter in the 1650s and 1660s, working from her home, first in Covent Garden and then on London's Fleet Street.
Mary Beale's Writings
In 1663, Mary Beale published Observations (Remarks). It is an unpublished educational writing that begins by giving a critical assessment of how to paint apricots. Observations also shows a good effort of association and collaboration between Mary and Charles.
He swaggeringly declared Mary Beale as an artist to be remembered. Mary Beale also wrote a manuscript called Discourse on Friendship in 1666 and four poems in 1667.
Painting as a business activity
As in other fields of business traditionally reserved for men at the time, it was not easy for a woman to establish herself in painting. Once Mary began painting for money in the 1670s, she chose her clients carefully, and used the esteem of her circle of friends to build a good reputation as a painter.
Some of these people included Queen Enrichetta Maria and John Tillotson, a clergyman at St. James's Church, a close friend of Mary Beale who eventually became Archbishop of Canterbury. It may be due to Mary's father John, who was a rector, or to her close connection with Tillotson that Mary kept St James' clergymen as her constant clients.
Her connection to Tillotson as well as her strong Puritan marriage to Charles worked in her favor to build her buina reputation. Mary Beale typically charged five pounds for a head painting and ten pounds for half a body in oil paintings. She made about two hundred pounds a year and gave ten percent of her earnings to charity.
This income was enough to support her family, and so she did. Needless to say, it is truly remarkable that Mary Beale was responsible for supporting her family. By 1681 Mary's orders were beginning to decline.
In 1681, Mary Beale took on two students, Keaty Trioche and Mr. More, who worked with her in the firm. In 1691, Sarah Curtis from Yorkshire became another of Mary's students.
Sarah had similar behaviors and dispositions to Mary. Mary Beale died on October 8, 1699. Her death was mistaken for that of Mary Beadle, whose death was recorded on December 28, 1697. Not much is known about her death other than that she died in a house in Pall Mall and was buried under the communion table at St. James Church.
The Beale children
Charles and Bartholomew Beale helped in their youth with studio work, where they painted tapestries and carved ovals; these ovals were a critical part of Mary Beale's head portraits. Young Charles Beale, the third-born son who bore his father's name, showed great talent in painting and in 1677 switched to studying it.
He dabbled in painting miniature sculptures from 1679 to 1688, when his eyesight began to fail him. From then on he worked on life-size portraits. Bartholomew Beale, the second son, began with painting but later turned to medicine.
In 1680, he began studying at Clare Hall (Cambridge) and graduated in 1682. Bartholomew opened his medical practice in a small property in Coventry that his father owned.
Her son Bartholomew Beale (1656-1709), by Sir Peter Lely, circa 1670
Praise and criticism of Mary Beale
Mary Beale's paintings are often described as "vigorous" and "masculine." (It was common at the time to praise a woman for her work by calling her "masculine.") Color is seen as pure, sweet, natural, clear, and fresh, although some critics see her coloring as "heavy and stiff" instead.
Copying Italian masterpieces for practice, Mary Beale is said to have acquired "an Italian air and style." Not many could compete with her "color, strength, vigor, or life." Sir Peter Lely admired her work, saying she "worked with a wonderful mass of color, and was extraordinarily industrious."
Others criticize her work as weak in expression and finish with unpleasant colors and poorly rendered hands. At times her style is described as "stilted" with a "limited color palette" and imitating Lely's work too closely.
Some of his work can be found on display in the Geffrye Museum in London, although the largest public collection can be found in the museum at Moyse's Hall, Bury St Edmunds, Suffolk.
Beale was the subject of a solo exhibition at the Geffrye Museum in 1975, which moved to the Towner Art Gallery in Eastbourne the following year.