Cornelius was the second son of Richard Varley, who had a keen interest in science. Until he was nineteen Cornelius was preoccupied with scientific rather than artistic pursuits, encouraged by his uncle Samuel (1752-1822) a watchmaker, manufacturer of scientific instruments and amateur scientist with whom he worked from the age of twelve. In 1811 Cornelius took out a patent for a Graphic Telescope, an adaptation of a camera lucida. The specification reads:

“My invention consists in combining one or two reflecting surfaces with a simple kind of telescope that inverts the object, and thereby gaining an erect image without any additional length to the telescope-placing the telescope out of the way of the image-and apparently projecting the said image flat on a table, so that it may be easily traced on paper; the image being seen by one eye, and the pencil or tracer by the other or by both eyes’.

The user of the PGT would see an image on a speculum mirror and a less clear image superimposed over the paper below it. The artist could then trace this image to accurately record their subject.

Portrait drawings made with the Graphic Telescope have an emphasis on the silhouette, as is evident in the present work, and Varley advertised the invention as designed ‘for drawing portraits’ (see ‘Cornelius Varley The Art of Observation’, Lowell Libson, 2005, p. 15 and footnote 24). Both John and Cornelius Varley drew portraits of their artistic colleagues including Cotman, Blake, Copley Fielding, W.H. Pyne, the Chalon brothers and Frederick Mackenzie.

John Sell Cotman used the telescope as did Samuel Prout and Thomas Horner (1785-1844), the owner of the Regent’s Park Colosseum. Cornelius Varley sometimes signed his drawings with P.G.T. after his name, signifying use of the Patent Graphic Telescope.

The PGT, which was manufactured by Cornelius, won many awards, including silver medals from the Society of Arts in 1831 and 1833, and a prize medal at the 1851 Great Exhibition. (See Huon Mallalieu, ‘Varley the Optician’, in ‘Cornelius Varley The Art of Observation’, stet, pp. 25-32).

The Whipple Museum, Cambridge have a fine example of the Patent Graphic Telescope made around 1840 https://www.whipplemuseum.cam.ac.uk/explore-whipple-collections/astronomy/art-and-astronomy-cornelius-varley

The artist married Elizabeth Livermore Straker (1798-1874) on 12 April 1821 at St Giles, Cripplegate, London. She was the daughter of John Straker and Elizabeth. Elizabeth and Cornelius had nine children, three girls and six boys. She outlived her husband by a year and is buried at Brookwood cemetery in Surrey.