Wycombe Museum: “Wrong sitter, wrong artist”

ARTIST AND ART HISTORIAN Cally Trench has beguiled audiences at Wycombe Museum before with her well-researched and thought-provoking Sunday afternoon explorations of artworks in the

museum collection.

The latest object to receive her attention is a 17th-century painting which was understood in 1934 to be a portrait of Sir Richard Browne – a Roundhead commander in the Civil War and MP for Wycombe. The sitter is, however, now known to be Sir Robert Vyner, the goldsmith who re-created the Crown of St Edward for the coronation of Charles II. He was also a shareholder in the Royal African Company, which was responsible for the transportation of thousands of enslaved people from Africa to the Caribbean, about 20% of whom died en-route