Portrait bust of Charles William Stewart Vane, 3rd Marquess of Londonderry (1778-1854)
workshop of Lorenzo Bartolini (Vernio, Tuscany 1777 – Florence 1850)
Category
Art / Sculpture
Date
c. 1820 - 1830
Materials
Alabaster
Measurements
388 x 318 x 172 mm
Place of origin
Florence
Order this imageCollection
Mount Stewart, County Down
NT 1220129
Summary
Sculpture, alabaster; Charles William Stewart Vane, 3rd Marquess of Londonderry (1778-1854); Workshop of Lorenzo Bartolini (1777-1850); c. 1820-30. A small version in alabaster of a marble bust by the Italian neo-classical sculptor Lorenzo Bartolini, formerly at Wynyard Park, Co. Durham. Bartolini also regularly worked n alabaster, a soft stone that is relatively easy to carve. The third marquess of Londonderry was a major patron of Bartolini.
Full description
Portrait bust in alabaster of Charles William Stewart Vane, 3rd Marquess of Londonderry (1778-1854), showing the sitter in classical drapery, and facing forwards. On a small rectangular base. This is a reduced-size copy of the full-size marble bust of the third Marquess by Lorenzo Bartolini, which was formerly at Wynyard Park, Co. Durham (Bartolini 2011, p. 94, fig. 13). The original sculpture was probably commissioned during the visit of the third Marquess and his wife to Florence in 1823, when Lord Londonderry also commissioned from the sculptor the standing figure of his wife with their son George (NT 1542334), as well as a life-size Venus, based on Titian’s famous painting of the Venus of Urbino. The third Marquess sold that sculpture a few years later; it may be the version today in a collection in the Bahamas, although there are others in the Lady Lever Art Gallery, Port Sunlight and in the Musée Fabre, Montpellier (Bartolini 2011, pp. 263-65, no. 37). He may also have commissioned from Bartolini a portrait bust of his wife, since in the Galleria dell’Accademia in Florence is a plaster bust of a woman, identified as Lady Londonderry (Inv. Sculture 1552). An impressive marble basin at Mount Stewart (NT 1221035) may also be a product of Lorenzo Bartolini’s workshop. Lord Londonderry, enjoying access to his wife’s vast fortune, was therefore a considerable patron of Lorenzo Bartolini during his and his wife’s brief stay in Florence in the early 1820s. By this time, Bartolini had become the most fashionable portrait sculptor in Florence, sculpting portraits of many of the foreign visitors, a good number of them British and Irish, who flocked to Florence after peace had finally returned to Europe. It seems quite probable that the small version of Bartolini's portrait at Mount Stewart, the only one known, would have been made in the sculptor’s workshop. In 1795 as a very young man, Lorenzo Bartolini moved to Volterra, the centre of the alabaster industry in central Italy, to work for the French alabaster sculptor Barthélemy Corneille (c. 1760–1812). He would therefore have been very familiar with the material, and in fact his carefully finished modello for his monument to Prince Nikolas Demidoff, made in 1837 (Museo Civico, Prato) is carved in alabaster. Jeremy Warren June 2025
Provenance
On loan to the National Trust from Lady Mairi Bury (1921-2009) since 1976; accepted by HM Government in lieu of Inheritance Tax and allocated to the National Trust in 2013
Makers and roles
workshop of Lorenzo Bartolini (Vernio, Tuscany 1777 – Florence 1850), sculptor
References
Bartolini 2011: Franca Falletti, Silvestra Bietoletti and Annarita Caputo, eds., Lorenzo Bartolini. Scultore del bello naturale, exh.cat. Galleria dell’Accademia, Florence 2011, p. 94, fig. 13. Lorenzo Bartolini Beauty and Truth in Marble (Franca Falletti, Silvestra Bietoletti, Annarita Caputo), Galleria dell'Accademia 31st May - 6th November 2011, fig, 13, p. 94