Larkin, William

Larkin, William (d London, Apr./May 1619).
English portrait painter. He emerged from total obscurity in 1952 with the publication of his only documented works—a pair of small oval portraits (1609–10) at Charlecote Park, Warwickshire (the sitters are Lord Herbert of Cherbury, who mentions the portrait in his celebrated autobiography, and his friend Sir Thomas Lucy). Subsequently, on circumstantial evidence, several other portraits have been attributed to Larkin; they are in a very different vein from the Charlecote pictures—full-lengths featuring elaborate Turkey carpets, dazzling metallic curtains, and poses of a starched magnificence, notably a breathtaking group at Ranger's House, London. If they are indeed all by Larkin he was the genius of Jacobean painting; Ellis Waterhouse considered the Ranger's House portraits to be the work of ‘at least three different hands’ (one of them perhaps Isaac Oliver's), but technical examination in the 1980s indicated they are all from the same studio.