Wolverhampton Art Gallery. On indefinite loan from a private collection.

The development of portrait painting was influenced by Thomas Gainsborough. Until the mid-18th century wealthy aristocratic patrons and royalty were the individuals who were generally painted. But the Enlightenment and Industrial Revolution awoke interest in people from other social backgrounds - professors, doctors, businessmen, mechanics, inventors, entrepreneurs. Thomas Gainsborough became famous as a fashionable painter of people from high society. But many of his works reflect this new interest, too. His portraits are not only of wealthy patrons but of his friends or of people whom he liked. They are portrayed with delicacy and warmth in a natural or informal setting. The “Portrait of James Donnithorne" shows the sitter, a tin-merchant, in his study. The account book is open on the table. The letter on the table gives the address of his premises in Lincoln's Inn in London. The books in the shelves suggest that he is a learned and intelligent man. The painting presents a dignified man in his business surroundings – a confident and successful member of the commercial middle class.