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Lot Essay
On stylistic grounds, Mannings dates this portrait to between 1774 and 1776, by which date Reynolds had established his reputation as the leading British portraitist. Elected the Royal Academy's first president in 1768 (a position that he held until his death), and knighted by King George III in 1769, Reynolds had delivered the first seven of his Discourses championing his theory of the Grand Style by 1778. Reynolds exhibited full-length portraits of Her Royal Highness the Dutchess of Gloucester and her daughter, The Princess Sophia at the Royal Academy in 1774 (nos. 214 and 215 respectively).
This portrait has traditionally been identified as of Elizabeth Sheridan (1754-1792), wife of Richard Brinsley Sheridan, Irish playwright. An old handwritten label previously on the stretcher, thought to be in the hand of Sir John Peter Boileau, identified the sitter as such and gave the provenance of the painting, stating 'Mr Colnaghi offered me directly after my purchase 10 percent of whatever I gave. he [sic] thought highly of it' (as recorded in Sotheby's catalogue for 12 January 1989).
This striking portrait was in a succession of important private collections during the eighteenth-, nineteenth-, and twentieth-centuries. It is first recorded in the collection of the Rigby family of Mistley Hall, Suffolk. Richard Rigby built Mistley Hall having amassed a fortune from the South Sea Company. His son and heir, also Richard, who rose to paymaster of the Forces in 1768 with the patronage of the Prince of Wales and the Duke of Bedford, made some alterations on the Hall, which was then demolished in the mid-nineteenth century.
By the mid-nineteenth century, this picture was owned by the antiquarian Sir John Peter Boileau, 1st Bt. (created 1838), at Ketteringham Park, Wymondham, Norfolk, with portraits by Sir Thomas Lawrence, Francis Cotes and John Hoppner. Boileau acquired Ketteringham in 1836 and built a Gothic hall there. He was a county magistrate and deputy lieutenant, before being elected High Sheriff of Norfolk in 1844. Boileau was connected with many erudite and charitable organizations in London, serving as vice-president of the Archaeological Institute, British Association, Royal Institution, Society of Arts, and Society of Antiquaries.
In 1951, the portrait was bequeathed to the Metropolitan Museum, New York, by Mary Stillman Harkness, wife of the American philanthropist, Edward Stephen Harkness (1874-1940), with works by other leading member of the British School, including Gainsborough, Raeburn and Constable, and Old Masters, such as Memling, Gerard David, Rembrandt, Hobbema, Guardi and Goya. The Report of the Trustees for that year noted 'the most notable bequest of objects of art was that of Mary Stillman Harkness, which substantially enriched the collection of several departments'. Edward Stephen Harkness, son of Stephen V. Harkness (d.1888), one of the six original stockholders in John D. Rockefeller's Standard Oil Company, devoted a great deal of his time to philanthropic pursuits, contributing to the nation's educational and health institutions, and ultimately, after his wife's death, to its artistic establishment. Proud of his Scottish ancestry, Harkness also gave generously to various British institutions, including the Shakespeare Memorial Theatre, and both the Universities of Oxford and St. Andrews. He attended the coronation of King George VI.
This portrait has traditionally been identified as of Elizabeth Sheridan (1754-1792), wife of Richard Brinsley Sheridan, Irish playwright. An old handwritten label previously on the stretcher, thought to be in the hand of Sir John Peter Boileau, identified the sitter as such and gave the provenance of the painting, stating 'Mr Colnaghi offered me directly after my purchase 10 percent of whatever I gave. he [sic] thought highly of it' (as recorded in Sotheby's catalogue for 12 January 1989).
This striking portrait was in a succession of important private collections during the eighteenth-, nineteenth-, and twentieth-centuries. It is first recorded in the collection of the Rigby family of Mistley Hall, Suffolk. Richard Rigby built Mistley Hall having amassed a fortune from the South Sea Company. His son and heir, also Richard, who rose to paymaster of the Forces in 1768 with the patronage of the Prince of Wales and the Duke of Bedford, made some alterations on the Hall, which was then demolished in the mid-nineteenth century.
By the mid-nineteenth century, this picture was owned by the antiquarian Sir John Peter Boileau, 1st Bt. (created 1838), at Ketteringham Park, Wymondham, Norfolk, with portraits by Sir Thomas Lawrence, Francis Cotes and John Hoppner. Boileau acquired Ketteringham in 1836 and built a Gothic hall there. He was a county magistrate and deputy lieutenant, before being elected High Sheriff of Norfolk in 1844. Boileau was connected with many erudite and charitable organizations in London, serving as vice-president of the Archaeological Institute, British Association, Royal Institution, Society of Arts, and Society of Antiquaries.
In 1951, the portrait was bequeathed to the Metropolitan Museum, New York, by Mary Stillman Harkness, wife of the American philanthropist, Edward Stephen Harkness (1874-1940), with works by other leading member of the British School, including Gainsborough, Raeburn and Constable, and Old Masters, such as Memling, Gerard David, Rembrandt, Hobbema, Guardi and Goya. The Report of the Trustees for that year noted 'the most notable bequest of objects of art was that of Mary Stillman Harkness, which substantially enriched the collection of several departments'. Edward Stephen Harkness, son of Stephen V. Harkness (d.1888), one of the six original stockholders in John D. Rockefeller's Standard Oil Company, devoted a great deal of his time to philanthropic pursuits, contributing to the nation's educational and health institutions, and ultimately, after his wife's death, to its artistic establishment. Proud of his Scottish ancestry, Harkness also gave generously to various British institutions, including the Shakespeare Memorial Theatre, and both the Universities of Oxford and St. Andrews. He attended the coronation of King George VI.