Lady Isabella Augusta Gregory
after Lisa Ramona Stillman (1865-1946)
Category
Art / Prints
Date
1893
Materials
Measurements
186 x 152 mm (7 1/3 x 6 in)
Order this imageCollection
Shaw's Corner, Hertfordshire
NT 1274692
Summary
Lithographic print after the original 1893 pastel portrait of Irish playwright Lady Augusta Gregory (1852-1932) by the American artist Eliza (Lisa) Ramona Stillman (1865 – 1946). Head and shoulders portrait.
Full description
Lithographic print after the original 1893 pastel portrait of Irish playwright Lady Augusta Gregory (1852-1932) by the American artist Eliza (Lisa) Ramona Stillman (1865 – 1946). Lady Augusta Gregory was one of the most important figures in Irish Theatre in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Her home at Coole Park in County Galway, Ireland, became a meeting place for many of the leading writers in the Irish Literary Revival, including W.B. Yeats. The Shaws stayed with her there on many occasions, and Shaw took many photographs of their holidays in this special place. Lady Gregory visited Shaw’s Corner several times over the years, and remembered her stays with much fondness: ‘warm and bright with fires in every room and pots of chrysanthemums’. Shaw also took photographs of Lady Gregory in the garden at Shaw’s Corner (NT 1715397). Many of her books and other writings can be found in the Shaws’ library. Together with Yeats, Lady Gregory founded the Irish Literary Theatre and the Abbey Theatre in Dublin, writing many works for both. Lady Gregory and Yeats asked Shaw for a play for their new theatre, and he responded with his comedy about Ireland John Bull’s Other Island (1904). After Lady Gregory died, the Irish State demolished her house at Coole Park in 1941. The doorknob from the hall door of Coole Park was presented to Shaw as a memento on his birthday in 1947 by Frank Curran of Galway. (NT 1275073). This portrait was reproduced in Shaw, Lady Gregory and the Abbey (eds Dan Laurence and Nicholas Grene, 1993, Plate 12). (Alice McEwan, 2020)
Provenance
The Shaw Collection. The house and contents were bequeathed to the National Trust by George Bernard Shaw in 1950, together with Shaw's photographic archive.
Marks and inscriptions
Inscribed top right -"LADY GREGORY / 1893" Framer's label on the back (Harry C. Murcott, London)
Makers and roles
after Lisa Ramona Stillman (1865-1946), artist