Thomas Hudson (1701–1779)

• Was an English painter who specialised in portrait painting.
• Hudson was born in Devon, in 1701.

• He studied under Jonathan Richardson in London.

• He married Richardson's daughter at some point before 1725.

• Hudson was most prolific between 1740 and 1760.

• He had many assistants, and employed the specialist drapery painter Joseph Van Aken.

• Joshua Reynolds, Joseph Wright and the drapery painter Peter Toms were his students. 

• Hudson visited the Low Countries in 1748 and Italy in 1752.

• In 1753, he bought a house at Cross Deep, Twickenham, just upstream from Pope's Villa.

• He retired toward the end of the 1750s.

• He died at Twickenham in 1779, aged 77 or 78. 

• His extensive private art collection was sold off in three separate sales.

• Many of Hudson's works may be seen in art galleries throughout the United Kingdom.

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