Portrait of Wilkie Collins, by Charles Allston Collins (1828-1873). 1853. Oil on panel. 11 3/4 x 9 1/2 inches (29.9 x 24.1 cm). Collection of the Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge. Accession no. 676. Image provided by the Fitzwilliam Museum for non-commercial use under a Creative Commons License (BY-NC-ND).
William "Wilkie" Collins was the elder brother of Charles Collins, having been born in 1824. In 1841 Wilkie was articled by his father to the London tea merchants Antrobus & Co., but he found this trade uncongenial. He clandestinely produced a novel, later published in 1850 as Antonina, which so impressed his father that he freed him from this apprenticeship. On May 18, 1848 his father caused his name to be entered at Lincoln's Inn and Wilkie was called to the bar on 21 November 1851. In that same year, however, he first met Charles Dickens who became his close friend and who changed the direction of his career into becoming a full-time writer. He published his first great success as a novelist, The Woman in White, as a serial in Dickens's All the Year Round between November 1859 and August 1860. In addition to novels Wilkie Collins also wrote plays. Charles Collins became a writer after he abandoned art in 1858, but he never became nearly as successful as his brother.
Wilkie was friends with John Everett Millais, his brother Charles's bosom chum, and both artists painted portraits of the novelist. Charles's portrait is dated 1853 and is the last known image of Wilkie without a beard. It shows him in a frontal view, seated at his desk, and writing with a quill pen. He is wearing a black jacket, a grey-checked waistcoat, a white shirt, and a black cravat. Rings are visible on the ring and little fingers of his left hand, which can also be seen in the earlier portrait of Wilkie by Millais of 1850. This portrait by Charles in fact originally belonged to Millais. After his death it was bought by Charles Fairfax Murray at Millais's estate sale held at Christie's on July 2, 1897, lot 7. Murray later presented it to the Fitzwilliam Museum in 1909.
A smaller portrait of Wilkie Collins,
also from 1850.
A slightly smaller portrait of Wilkie Collins by his brother, also oil on panel but dated 1850, sold at Sotheby's Belgravia on 10 April 1973. Instead of being a frontal view, however, this is a three-quarter profile facing to the right. Wilkie is dressed in a black coat and vest and a white shirt with a winged collar. He is looking downwards as he winds his watch attached to a watch fob.
Collins's three-quarter profile portrait is the same size and from the same year as Millais's portrait of Wilkie. Millais's portrait is again a three-quarter profile of Collins, but in this case the writer is facing left. Wilkie's clothing is not identical in the two portraits, suggesting they were not done at the same time. In Millais's portrait Wilkie wears a dark brown coat and waistcoat with light brown trousers and a white shirt with a winged collar. He is looking slightly downwards and holds his hands together at the fingertips. This portrait is now in the National Portrait Gallery, London.
Bibliography
Portrait of Wilkie Collins. Fitzwilliam Museum. Web. 15 September 2024.
Rose, Andrea. Pre-Raphaelite Portraits. Yeoville, Somerset: Oxford Illustrated Press, 1981. 75.
Victorian Paintings, Drawings and Watercolours. London: Sotheby's Belgravia (10 April 1973): lot 156. 71.
Created 15 September 2024