Printed from Woolley & Wallis

Description

Circle of Thomas Gainsborough
Portrait of a lady, traditionally identified as Miss Sparrow, but possibly H.R.H. Duchess of Gloucester and Edinburgh (1736-1807), half-length in a painted oval, wearing an ermine trimmed blue gown
Oil on canvas
30.7 x 24.3cm; 12 x 9½in

Provenance:
Henry Joseph Pfungst (1844-1917);
His posthumous sale, Christie, Manson & Woods, London, Catalogue of the Collection of Works by Thomas Gainsborough..., 15 June 1917, lot 77 (as Gainsborough), where purchased by Connell & Sons, London;
English Private Collection;
Chiswick Auctions, London, Happy & Glorious: God Save The King, 4 May 2023, lot 1, where purchased by the present owner (as Portrait of a lady said to be the Duchess of Gloucester)

Literature:
Catalogue of the Pfungst collection of drawings & studies by Thomas Gainsborough (London, 1915), no.37 (illustrated);
Hugh Belsey, Thomas Gainsborough (Yale University Press, 2019), vol.2, p.777, no.832c (whereabouts unknown)

The present work is a small version of Thomas Gainsborough's portrait of a lady, who has traditionally been identified as Miss Sparrow, today in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York (see Hugh Belsey, Thomas Gainsborough (Yale University Press, 2019), no.832). As Belsey has written the identity of the sitter 'remains elusive'. She acquired the identification of Miss Sparrow in 1870 when Gainsborough's portrait was engraved, although there is no further information about how this identification was arrived at. A 19th-century copy identifies her as the Duchess of Gloucester. Maria Walpole, Duchess of Gloucester certainly sat for Gainsborough three times (see Belsey, nos.403-405). The label on the back of our work, which dates from its time in the Pfungst collection, conflates the two possible sitters, reading 'Miss Sparrow married the Duke of Gloucester' but this is erroneous.

Gainsborough himself painted several small versions of his portraits, which would have been easier to travel with (see for example Belsey nos 36 & 915). The Duke and Duchess of Gloucester travelled extensively throughout Europe, having been banished from the court for marrying in secret.