A Portrait Painter and his Wife
Anglo-Dutch School
Category
Art / Oil paintings
Date
circa 1745
Materials
Oil on canvas
Measurements
1140 x 952 mm (44 7/8 x 37 1/2 in)
Place of origin
England
Order this imageCollection
Upton House, Warwickshire
NT 446694
Caption
This picture was bought by Lord Bearsted, who owned Upton House, for £600 as ‘Peg Woffington & A. Pond’. The ‘Pond’ referred to was the artist Arthur Pond, who was also thought to have painted the picture. However, today the attribution of the painting is as uncertain as the identity of the sitters. Comparison with Pond’s painting of around 1758 of Woffington is only superficially similar. The view of the painting studio beyond, complete with unframed portraits, and the fact that the man is sketching, suggest that the sitters must be an artist and his wife. The lady is shown knotting from a bobbin, along with a charming vignette of a cat playing with the twine under the table.
Summary
Oil painting on canvas, A Portrait Painter and his Wife, Anglo-Dutch School, circa 1745. The interior of a carpeted room, with a view to a painting studio beyond. A lady sits left, at a table, knotting from a bobbin and wearing a white satin dress, pale blue coat edged with ermine (does this denote a noblewoman? - or was the sitter just sailing very close to the wind?), and a lace cap. A man is seated, right, behind the table, wearing a navy-blue coat, white satin waistcoat with gold braid, white stock and cuffs, and holding a porte-crayon. A cat and two dogs – a pug and a toy spaniel – are in the room. Behind is a studio, with unframed portraits (of not very English type) on the floor. The chair and table on the conspicuous Turkey carpet are unmistakably English.
Provenance
Said to have belonged to stockbroker W. M. de Zoete (1845-1934)[his sale Christie's, London, on 5 April 1935]; with Leggatt, 1926, from whom acquired by Lord Bearsted in April 1926, for £600, as “Peg Woffington & A. Pond”, by the latter; given with Upton House to the National Trust by Walter Samuel, 2nd Viscount Bearsted (1882 – 1948), in 1948, shortly before his death
Credit line
Upton House, The Bearsted Collection (National Trust)
Makers and roles
Anglo-Dutch School, publisher possibly Marcus Tuscher (Nuremberg 1705 – Copenhagen 1751), publisher previously catalogued as attributed to Arthur Pond (London 1701 – Rome 1758), publisher previously catalogued as attributed to Pieter van Bleeck (The Hague c.1695 - England 1764) , publisher previously catalogued as attributed to Frans van der Myn (Antwerp 1719 - London 1783), publisher
References
Holmes 1932 Sir Charles Holmes, ‘Neglected English Masters’, Burlington Magazine, LX, 1932, p.302, pl. 11d Collins Baker and James, 1933: C. H. Collins Baker and Montague R. James, British Painting, London 1933, p. 90 Sitwell 1936 Sacheverell Sitwell, Conversation Pieces, A Survey of English Domestic Portraits and their Painters, London, 1936 Waterhouse 1946 E.K. Waterhouse, ‘English Conversation Pieces of the 18th Century’, Burlington Magazine, LXXXVIII, 1946, p.152 Waterhouse 1994 Ellis K. Waterhouse, Painting in Britain 1530-1790, Pelican History of Art, Harmondsworth, [1st Pub.1953], 1994 ed., p. 149 Staring 1968 A. Staring, ‘De Van der Mijns in Engeland, II’, Nederlands Kunsthistorisch Jaarboek, 19, 1968, pp.179-81, pl.5