Branding Angelica: Reputation Management in Late Eighteenth-Century England

Abstract

Reputation management is a contemporary offshoot of public relations, but reputation has long had economic currency in British culture. Less well studied is the way commercial reputation consolidated around ideas of the brand. This case study of the London career of the Swiss-born artist Angelica Kauffman (1741-1807) examines the development of the ‘Angelica' brand: from stage-managed debut, studio establishment and performance, and self-promotion through self-portraiture to market positioning, diffusion lines and pricing strategy. It tests the success of Kauffman's efforts by examining critical reception, consumer response and, finally, damage limitation, concluding that the Angelica brand was the painter's cleverest creation.