{{Short description|Painting by Philippe Mercier}} {{Infobox artwork | image_file=File:Frederick, Prince of Wales, and his sisters by Philip Mercier.jpg | image_upright=1.5 | title=The Music Party | artist=Philippe Mercier | year=1733 | type=Oil on canvas, Conversation piece | height_metric=45.1 | width_metric=57.8 | metric_unit=cm | imperial_unit=in | museum=National Portrait Gallery | city= London }} '''''The Music Party''''' is a 1733 oil painting by the French artist Philippe Mercier.<ref>Millar p.12</ref> It depicts four members of the British Royal Family, the heir to the throne Frederick, Prince of Wales and his sisters Anne, Caroline and Amelia. A conversation piece, they are shown playing musical instruments while the redbrick Dutch House of Kew Palace can be seen in the background.<ref>Cumming p.57</ref> Mercier was a Berlin-born Huguenot who settled in Britain in 1716 and enjoyed great patronage from Frederick. Today the painting is in the collection of the National Portrait Gallery in London.<ref>https://www.npg.org.uk/collections/search/portrait/mw00125/The-Music-Party</ref>
A separate version depicting the same group of figures, but shown inside Kew Palace, is in the Royal Collection<ref>https://www.rct.uk/collection/402414/the-music-party-frederick-prince-of-wales-with-his-three-eldest-sisters</ref>
==References== {{Reflist}}
==Bibliography== * Cumming, Valerie. ''Royal Dress: The Image and the Reality, 1580 to the Present Day''. B.T. Batsford, 1989. * Millar, Oliver. ''Frederick, Prince of Wales and His Circle''. Gainsborough's House, 1981. * Rorschach, Kimerly. ''Frederick, Prince Of Wales as a Patron of the Visual Arts: Princely Patriotism and Political Propaganda''. Yale University, 1985.
{{DEFAULTSORT:Music Party, The}} Category:1733 paintings Category:Paintings in the National Portrait Gallery, London Category:Oil paintings on canvas Category:London in art Category:18th-century portraits Category:Frederick, Prince of Wales
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