1779 in art

Events

• August 25 – The Salon of 1779 opens at the Louvre in Paris.
• October 8 – William Blake enrols as a student with the Royal Academy of Arts at Somerset House in London.

Paintings

• Antoine-François Callet – Portrait of Louis XVI
• Joseph Duplessis – Portrait of the Comte d'Angiviller
• Thomas Gainsborough – Gypsy Encampment, Sunset
• Per Krafft the Elder – Carl Michael Bellman
• Charles Willson Peale – George Washington at Princeton
• Joshua Reynolds
• * Lady Elizabeth Delmé and Her Children
• * '
• * Admiral Lord Keppel
• Dominic Serres
• * Destruction of the American Fleet at Penobscot Bay
• * The Battle of Quiberon Bay
• George Stubbs
• * '
• * A Lion and a Tiger
• *
• Benjamin West
• * Portrait of George III
• * ''Portrait of Queen Charlotte''

Births

• January 3 – Gustav Philipp Zwinger, German painter
• February 20 – Augustus Wall Callcott, English landscape painter
• March 21 – Vojtěch Benedikt Juhn, Czech painter and engraver
• April 19 - Anson Dickinson, American painter of miniature portraits
• May 27 – Juan Antonio Ribera, Spanish Neoclassicism painter
• July 8 – Giorgio Pullicino, Maltese painter and architect
• July 26 – Erik Gustaf Göthe, Swedish sculptor
• August 24 – Charles Norris, English topographical etcher and writer known for his landscape work of the Welsh countryside
• November 4 – Jan Willem Pieneman, Dutch historical painter
• November 5 – Washington Allston, American painter, the "American Titian"
• November 6 – Henry Pierce Bone, English enamel painter
• December 9 – Moritz Retzsch, German painter and etcher date unknown
• * Paolo Caronni, Italian engraver
• * Guillaume Descamps, French painter and engraver
• * Vasily Demut-Malinovsky, Russian sculptor in the Empire style

Deaths

• January 26 – Thomas Hudson, English portrait painter
• February 4 – John Hamilton Mortimer, English Neoclassical painter known primarily for his romantic paintings and pieces set in Italy and its countryside
• March 14 – Joseph-Charles Roettiers, French engraver and medallist
• April – Károly Bebo, Hungarian sculptor, builder and decorator noted for his stucco work
• June 29 – Anton Raphael Mengs, German painter
• September 14 – Anton Pichler, Austrian goldsmith and engraver
• October – John Giles Eccardt, German-born English portrait painter
• December 6 – Jean-Baptiste-Siméon Chardin, French painter