Isaac Fuller

Isaac Fuller(1606(?) – 1672) was an English painter. Trained in France, he worked in Oxford and London. His works included portraits, religious subjects and decorative paintings.

Fuller is often said to have been born in 1606, but may have been born as late as 1620.According to Bainbrigg Buckeridge, writing at the beginning of the 18th century, he studied under the French Baroque painterFrançois Perrierin Paris.

During the earlier part of the 1660s Fuller decorated the chapels ofMagdalenandAll SoulsColleges at Oxford. His work at Magdalen representing theResurrectionis lost, but a print survives, showing a complex and ambitious composition derived ultimately from Michelangelo.At All Souls he painted a fresco ofThe Last Judgement, which is also lost, although some additional panels by Fuller, originally fitted between the roof-trusses in the chancel, survive.John Evelynsaid that the fresco would not last long, being "too full of nakeds".He also painted an altarpiece for the chapel atWadham College, using an unusual technique in which the image was drawn on grey cloth in brown and white crayons, and then ironed into the fabric.Joseph Addisonwrote a poem in praise of it.

In London Fuller did a lot of work as decorative painter, especially in taverns. These included the Sun near theRoyal Exchange, and the Mitre inFenchurch Street, where he decorated the walls of a large room with life-sized mythological figures, and the ceiling with two angels holding a mitre.[7]He also painted the ceiling over the staircase in a house inSoho Square, and a ceiling atPainter-Stainers'Hall.

While at Oxford he painted portraits, and also copiedWilliam Dobson'sDecollation of St. John, altering the heads to portraits of his own friends.[6]As a portrait painter Fuller had some real power, and self-portrait, in theBodleian Libraryat Oxford, shows him in a curious head-dress.John Elsumwrote an epigram on it.[6]There is a related drawing by Fuller in the collection of theVictoria and Albert Museum, probably the preparatory work for a print.There is a portrait of Fuller, drawn byGeorge Vertue, in the collection of theBritish Museum.

Other portraits painted by Fuller were ofSamuel Butler,Edward Piercethe carver, andJohn Ogilby, the author (these two were in theStrawberry HillCollection, and the latter was engraved byWilliam Camden Edwards), Norris, the king's frame-maker (a picture much praised bySir Peter Lely),John Cleveland,Sir Kenelm Digby, and Jasper Latham, the sculptor.

Horace Walpolewrote that "in his historic compositions Fuller is a wretched painter: his colouring was raw and unnatural, and not compensated by disposition or invention", but praised his portraits, in which "his pencil was bold strong and masterly".

Source:https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Isaac_Fuller