JOHN

See also:

• SMART, CHRISTOPHER (1722-1771)
• SMART, HENRY (1813–1879)
• JOHN SMART (c. 1740–1811)
• SMART, SIR GEORGE THOMAS (1776–1867)

SMART (c. 1740–1811)  , English miniature painter, was born in Norfolk; he became a pupil of Cosway, and is frequently alluded to in his correspondence . This artist was director and vice-president of the Incorporated Society of Artists, and exhibited with that society . He went to India in 1788 and obtained a number of commissions in that country . He settled down in London in 1797 and there died . He married Edith Vere, and is believed to have had only one son, who died in Madras in ,8oq . He was a little man, of simple habits, and a member of the Society of Sandemanians . Many of his pencil drawings still exist in the possession of the descendants of a great friend of his only sister . Several of his miniatures are in Australia and belong to a cadet branch of the family . His work is entirely different to that of Cosway, quiet and grey in its colouring, with the flesh tints elaborated with much subtlety and modelled in exquisite fashion . He possessed a great knowledge of anatomy, and his portraits are drawn with greater anatomical accuracy and possess more distinction than those of any miniature painter of his time . See The History of Portrait Miniatures, by G . C .

Williamson, vol. ii . (London, 1904) . (G . C .