This miniature is a copy of another miniature portrait of King George III (RCIN 421069) and probably by the same artist. King George is wearing Windsor uniform with the ribbon and star of the Order of the Garter. His head is copied from the full-length portrait by Thomas Gainsborough (RCIN 401406). Copies of the Gainsborough portrait were very popular and often given as gifts from the King or Queen. In 1794 George granted to General Paoli, together with a pension, 'a gold chain with my picture set in diamonds for him to wear on all public occasions … Collins may have orders to paint the picture'.

Richard Collins (1755-1831) was born in Gosport and entered the Royal Academy Schools in 1776 at the age of 21 and exhibited there between 1777 and 1818. When George III visited in 1787, a contemporary observer noted: 'Collins, whose name was on one of the miniature pictures, King admired, and Queen said he had done her portrait for Lady Pembroke'. Collins painted on both ivory and enamel but rarely signed his work. In his portraits of George III, the brush strokes are blended closely together and he achieves a clean, waxy effect with strong highlights and misty eyes. He was appointed Principal Painter in Enamel to George III from 1789, because the King felt sorry for him after the death of his wife in 1788, according to his friend the artist Ozias Humphry.

Framed in white and green enamel set with pearls. Plaits of dark brown hair in the back with a small gold cartouche (scroll): KING GEORGE III.