Lot Essay
'And four romping daughters too', commented the Art Journal, 'with legs and arms at random flung, and pelting each other with primroses. Rather a waste of flowers and paint, and with sins against every law of composition in the dislocation of the lines and limits, but nevertheless containing some excellent painting.'
The picture, which cost the sitters' father #525, is recorded as being finished on 31 March 1884 (just in time for the Royal Academy) and paid for in July. Collier painted most of the Makins family, following this group with likenesses of the Colonel and Mrs Makins in 1886. Educated at Harrow and Trinity College, Cambridge, Colonel William Thomas Makins (1840-1906) was called to the bar in 1863 and entered Parliament in 1874. He was to sit for three different Essex constituencies until 1892, evidently in the Tory interest since he was a member of the Carlton Club. A J.P. and Deputy-Chairman of the Great Eastern Railway, he was created a baronet in 1902. His London address was 1 Lowther Gardens, S.W.7, and his country residence Rotherfield Court, Henley-on-Thames, one of which no doubt provided the background for this picture.
The picture, which cost the sitters' father #525, is recorded as being finished on 31 March 1884 (just in time for the Royal Academy) and paid for in July. Collier painted most of the Makins family, following this group with likenesses of the Colonel and Mrs Makins in 1886. Educated at Harrow and Trinity College, Cambridge, Colonel William Thomas Makins (1840-1906) was called to the bar in 1863 and entered Parliament in 1874. He was to sit for three different Essex constituencies until 1892, evidently in the Tory interest since he was a member of the Carlton Club. A J.P. and Deputy-Chairman of the Great Eastern Railway, he was created a baronet in 1902. His London address was 1 Lowther Gardens, S.W.7, and his country residence Rotherfield Court, Henley-on-Thames, one of which no doubt provided the background for this picture.