Mason Chamberlin RA (1727 - 1787)

RA Collection: People and Organisations

Mason Chamberlin was a Founder Member of the Royal Academy, known for his compelling portraits of leading 18th-century figures including American founding father Benjamin Franklin.

Born in London in 1727, Chamberlin was orphaned as a child. He worked briefly as a clerk before training as an artist. He is said to have studied with the painter and fellow future Royal Academician Francis Hayman, who would go on to become the Academy’s first Librarian. By the 1760s he was exhibiting work regularly with the Society of Artists, winning a second premium of 50 guineas (then a huge amount) for a history painting in 1764.

In 1762 Chamberlin was commissioned to paint his best-known work, a portrait of Benjamin Franklin. Fifteen years prior to the Declaration of Independence, Franklin was already a widely known and respected figure for his scientific achievements and inventions. Chamberlin’s portrait highlights his accomplishments in these areas, depicting him surrounded by three of his most famous experiments. Franklin was delighted with the portrait and distributed copies of the mezzotint (later made by the engraver Edward Fisher) to his friends for the next ten years.

In 1768 Chamberlin joined with the country’s other leading artists and architects in petitioning the King to approve the foundation of a Royal Academy of Arts, becoming a Founder Member when it was approved. The next year he painted the new Academy’s Professor of Anatomy, the Scottish physician Dr William Hunter, which he presented to the Academy.

Chamberlin exhibited regularly at the Royal Academy from 1769 until his death in 1787. He was survived by his son, also named Mason Chamberlin, who became a well-respected landscape painter.