John OPIE (1761-1807)Portrait of John Knill (1 January 1733 - 29 March 1811)Oil on canvas linedInscribed and dated 1777 to the frame69.5 x 50.5cm(See illustration)John Knill (1733-1811) was a lawyer and customs collector and slightly eccentric Mayor of St Ives. His name is still in common usage in Cornwall due to 'Knill's Monument,' his own memorial, which he erected on Worral Hill, St Ives in 1782. The peculiar customs associated with the monument and stipulated by Knill are still observed to this day:"The total cost of the monument was £226 1s. 6d. Sixpence a year is paid to the owner of Tregenna for a right of way to the obelisk. By a deed dated May 29th, 1797, Knill settled upon the mayor and capital burgesses of S. Ives, and their successors for ever, an annuity of £10 as a rent-charge, to be paid out of the manor of Glivian, in Mawgan, which sum is annually to be put into a chest which is not to be opened except at the end of every five years. Then, out of the accumulated sum, a dinner was to be given to the mayor, collector of customs, and vicar of S. Ives, and two friends to be invited by each of them, and £15 to be equally divided among ten girls, natives of S. Ives, under ten years old, who should, between 10 a.m. and noon on S. James the Apostle's Day, dance and sing round the mausoleum, to the fiddling of a man who was to receive a pound for so doing and for fiddling as the procession of girls went to the obelisk and returned. One pound was to be laid out in white ribbons for the damsels and a cockade for the fiddler. Some of the money was to go to keep the mausoleum in repair, and there were certain benefactions also recorded.The first Knillian celebration took place in July, 1801, when, according to the will of the founder, a band of little girls, all dressed in white, with two widows and a company of musicians, marched in procession to the top of the hill, where they danced about the monument, then, as Knill desired, sang the Hundredth Psalm to its old melody, and after that returned in the same order to S. Ives. The ceremony still takes place every fifth year."The next ceremony will take place on July 25th 2021.Knill was described by a relative as having a wide circle of acquaintances and being highly esteemed by all who knew him. In 1773 he was sent by the Government to be Inspector of Ports in Jamaica. He returned to St Ives after a year and in 1777 became the private secretary to the Earl of Buckinghamshire, in Dublin, where the Earl was the newly appointed Lord Lieutenant of Ireland. This portrait by Opie was painted in 1777 and was not finished until 1808.The following memorandum signed by J Knill is preserved: "Paid Mr Acres for painting hands and blue coat to a portrait of me by Opie, painted at Penzance in 1777, who only finished the head, for which I paid Opie one guinea, and now Mr Acres one pound one shilling. December 30, 1808. J.K."As Opie was born in 1761 he would have only been 16 or 17 when this portrait was painted. His reputation was spreading and prominent wealthy Cornish families were realising they could acquire London quality portraits from the 'Cornish Wonder'. As Knill went to Ireland in 1777, this may be why the portrait was unfinished. Opie died unexpectedly in 1807 and Knill had the portrait completed the following year. Opie had become a very respected artist and held a prestigious post at the Royal Academy, as Professor of Painting. It is not implausible that the inevitable shock of his sudden death caused a surge of interest in his work and this motivated Knill to have the portrait finished. The Penrose connection comes via John Knill's half sister Mary Jope, who married John Rogers of Penrose (1778-1856). Their son, John Jope Rogers, wrote OPIE AND HIS WORKS in 1878, which contained a list of known paintings by Opie.We are grateful to Viv Hendra for his assistance with cataloguing this lot.Provenance: The Penrose Estate, Porthleven, Cornwall. Condition report: In common with many of the Penrose portraits this was restored and lined in the 1920's. It has craquelure.
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