Walter Strickland (1729 - 1761)
George Romney (Dalton-in-Furness 1734 – Kendal 1802)
Category
Art / Oil paintings
Date
1760
Materials
Oil on canvas
Measurements
1210 x 990 mm
Order this imageCollection
Sizergh Castle, Cumbria
NT 998426
Caption
George Romney would eventually become one of society's most sought after portrait painters, but early support from the Strickland family was invaluable to his artistic development. The portrait shows Walter Strickland, who invited Romney to visit Sizergh and so provided the young painter with a rare opportunity to study and copy French paintings.
Summary
Oil painting on canvas, Walter Strickland (1729 - 1761) by George Romney (Dalton-in-Furness 1734 – Kendal 1802), 1760. A portrait, in red coat and cloak. Eldest son of Thomas Peter Strickland and Mary Scrope, the sitter inherited the Sizergh Estate on the death of his father in 1754 and married Margaret Messenger four years later. The couple commissioned Romney, then based in nearby Kendal, to paint their likenesses as a pair of pendant portraits in 1760 at a cost of £10 10s (see NT998427). The portrait was previously believed to be that of his younger brother, Charles. However, Romney’s portrait of Charles (NT998133), showing him fishing by the cascade below Force Bridge on the River Kent, was sold at auction in 1896 and in 2019 was purchased for the National Trust with support from the ACE/V&A Purchase Grant Fund, from local fundraising, from a private donor and from the Royal Oak Foundation.
Provenance
Painted for the sitter and paid for in 1760; Christie's sale, 18 July 1896, lot 20 (bought in); thence by descent; given by Henry Hornyold Strickland (1890 – 1975) with Sizergh Castle and its estates in 1950.
Makers and roles
George Romney (Dalton-in-Furness 1734 – Kendal 1802), publisher
References
Kidson 2015 Alex Kidson, George Romney: A Complete Catalogue of his Paintings, Yale, 2015, Vol.II, p.557