William Young Ottley

Art collector and Keeper of Prints and Drawings at the British Museum. William Young Ottley was the son of Richard Ottley (UCL Department of History, ‘Sir Richard Ottley’, in UCL Department of History (ed.), Legacies of British Slave-ownership [online], London 2020, accessed 28 June 2021) and Sarah Elizabeth Ottley (UCL Department of History, ‘Sarah Elizabeth Ottley, née Young’, in UCL Department of History (ed.), Legacies of British Slave-ownership [online], London 2020, accessed 28 June 2021). His mother was the daughter of Sir William Young, 1st Bart. (UCL Department of History, ‘Sir William Young 1st Bart.’, in UCL Department of History (ed.), Legacies of British Slave-ownership [online], London 2020, accessed 28 June 2021), an owner of estates and enslaved people in Antigua, St Vincent and Tobago. Her brother, Sir William Young, 2nd Bart. (UCL Department of History, ‘Sir William Young 2nd Bart.’, in UCL Department of History (ed.), Legacies of British Slave-ownership [online], London 2020, accessed 28 June 2021), who inherited four of the estates, was a prominent pro-slavery campaigner. William Young Ottley and Sarah Elizabeth Ottley were shown as the owners of 17 enslaved people on Antigua in the 1817 Slave Register for Antigua. In 1787 Ottley entered the Royal Academy Schools, studying briefly under John Brown until the latter’s death that year, after which he bought the contents of his studio, which formed the beginning of his own art collection. From 1791–9 he studied in Italy, continuing to build up his collection, acquiring such pictures as Botticelli’s Mystic Nativity and Raphael’s An Allegory (‘Vision of a Knight’). In 1823 he sold the bulk of his Italian drawings to Sir Thomas Lawrence; these included drawings by Raphael and Michelangelo which had been stolen from the French artist Jean-Baptiste Wicar, and acquired by Ottley from the Florentine painter Antonio Fedi. William Young Ottley and his wife Sarah Elizabeth Ottley were shown as the owners of 17 enslaved people on Antigua in the 1817 Slave Register. The infant Christ reaches up towards the Virgin Mary, oblivious of his visitors – the Three Kings on the left and the shepherds on the right. The golden dome of heaven has opened up and is circled by 12 angels holding olive branches entwined with scrolls and hung with crowns. In the foreground, t... A nun clad in white stands against gleaming gold, holding lilies and a book. Her white robes and black hood tell us she belongs to the Camaldolite Order.This small painting is one of 12 panels called the Littleton Pilaster Saints. Six are on loan to the National Gallery. The size and shape of the... Christ’s body has been taken down from the Cross and is being carried on a shroud to his place of burial. His head rests limply on his shoulder; his pale, foreshortened body is the focus of a whole retinue of grieving figures, each expressing their sorrow in a different way.This small picture is... This panel – a pinnacle panel – comes from the uppermost part of a large multi-panelled altarpiece painted for the church of Santa Croce, Florence. There were originally six of these, and four survive. Two others are in our collection (they show King David and Moses), as well as panels from other... A shepherd boy leads a flock of sheep along a country track between two dark banks of trees. Other figures sit in the shadows at the side of the lane. The strongly lit country path contrasts with the darkly massed trees, guiding our eye towards a light, hazy, distant hillside. Dughet has also use... The story of the honest woodsman – the subject of Rosa’s painting – is taken from Aesop’s Fables, a collection of moral tales from ancient Greece. In the story, the god Mercury takes pity on a woodsman who has accidentally dropped his axe into a river. He retrieves two axes from the water, one go... This panel comes from the uppermost part of a large altarpiece painted for the high altar of the church of Santa Croce, Florence.