Portrait of Sir Edward Coley Burne-Jones, Bt., A.R.A. (1833-1898), three-quarter-length, seated in an armchair, smoking a pipe

George James Howard, 9th Earl of Carlisle, was associated with a group of English landscape artists working in Italy who called themselves the 'Etruscans', in honour of their master Giovanni Costa. Howard met Burne-Jones in 1865 and took lessons from him. He acquired a few of his early paintings and later commissioned him to execute, major works both for his London house in Palace Green and for his two country seats, Castle Howard in Yorkshire and Naworth Castle in Cumberland.