Witness My Act and Deed

Witness My Act and Deed was exhibited at the Royal Academy in 1882 — one of three Paton works shown there that year — and became one of the best-known paintings of his career. The title is a legal phrase used to attest a signature on a document, and the painting plays on it with characteristic wit. Frank Paton (23 November 1855 – 13 November 1909) was born in Stepney, London, the son of a Thames maritime pilot, and grew up in Gravesend, Kent. He first exhibited at the Royal Academy in 1878, where his painting was purchased by the dealer Edward Ernest Leggatt, beginning a partnership that defined Paton's career: Leggatt published engravings of his works and issued his annual Christmas cards from 1880 until Paton's death in 1909. A full set of Paton's prints was donated to the British Museum by Leggatt in 1919. Paton showed twenty works at the Royal Academy between 1878 and 1890, when a dispute with the organisers ended his participation. He continued to work prolifically until the day he died. The painting is in a private collection; an engraving after it by J. B. Pratt, published jointly by E. E. Leggatt in London and Knoedler & Co. in New York on 12 June 1883, brought the image to a wide audience.