少年时,雷诺兹受泰奥弗拉斯托斯的柏拉图主义哲学影响,这种影响在他后来一生的轨迹中都可以找到。雷诺兹的摘录簿中记录着泰奥弗拉斯托斯、普鲁塔克、塞内卡、奥维德、马克·安东尼、威廉·莎士比亚、约翰·弥尔顿、亚历山大·蒲柏、约翰·德莱顿等人的言论与列奥纳多·达·芬奇、Charles Alphonse Du Fresnoy和安德鲁·菲利比安的艺术理论。[1]对雷诺兹音影响最大的一本书是乔纳森·理查德森的著作《一篇关于绘画的随笔》(An Essay on the Theory of Painting,1715年),其由雷诺兹注释的抄本失传近200年,最后出现在剑桥书店,署名“J. Reynolds Pictor”。[1]
1749年,雷诺兹遇到了奥古斯特·凯珀尔,并受邀参凯珀尔指挥的英国皇家海军的HMS Centurion。他随船游览了里斯本、阿尔及尔和米诺卡岛。并从米诺卡岛启程前往里窝那,随后抵达罗马,[3]在那里逗留了两年。[4]在此期间患上了严重的伤寒,几乎导致耳聋,这也是为什么后来其肖像常见有号角状助听器的原因。雷诺兹经由佛罗伦萨、博洛尼亚、威尼斯[5]和巴黎[6]归国。他的旅伴是朱塞佩·马奇( Giuseppe Marchi),当时年界17岁。[7]1770年之后,马奇成为了雷诺兹终身的工作室助理。[7]
Martin Postle, ‘Reynolds, Sir Joshua (1723–1792)’, Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford University Press, 2004; online edn, Oct 2009. Retrieved 24 Sep 2010.
P. J. Marshall and John A. Woods (eds.), The Correspondence of Edmund Burke. Volume VII. January 1792–August 1794 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1968), pp. 75-76.
James Boswell, Life of Johnson (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2008).
Charles Robert Leslie and Tom. Taylor, Life and Times of Sir Joshua Reynolds (London: John Murray, 1865, 2 volumes).
Ian McIntyre, Joshua Reynolds. The Life and Times of the First President of the Royal Academy (London: Allen Lane, 2003).
Martin Postle, ‘Reynolds, Sir Joshua (1723–1792)’, Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford University Press, 2004; online edn, Oct 2009. Retrieved 24 Sep 2010.
John Barrell, The Political Theory of Painting from Reynolds to Hazlitt (1986).
A. Graves and W. V. Cronin, A History of the Works of Sir Joshua Reynolds (1899–1901, 4 volumes).
F. W. Hilles, The Literary Career of Sir Joshua Reynolds (1936).
Derek Hudson, Sir Joshua Reynolds: A Personal Study (1958).
J. Ingamells and J. Edgcumbe (eds.), The Letters of Sir Joshua Reynolds (2000).
E. Malone (ed.), The Works of Sir Joshua Reynolds (1798, 3 volumes).
D. Mannings, Sir Joshua Reynolds PRA, 1723–92 (1992).
J. Northcote, Memoirs of Sir Joshua Reynolds, knt. (1813–15).
J. Northcote, The Life of Sir Joshua Reynolds (1818, 2nd edition, 2 volumes).
Martin Postle, Joshua Reynolds: The Creation of Celebrity (Tate, 2005). ISBN 1-85437-564-4
Martin Postle, Sir Joshua Reynolds: The Subject Pictures (1995).