Lot Essay
It has been suggested that the sitter is Elizabeth Pigot, wife of William Pigot and daughter of William Brooke, Mayor of Doncaster. Wright painted a three-quarter-length portrait of Elizabeth Pigot in 1760, now in the Doncaster Museum and Art Gallery (see B. Nicolson, Joseph Wright of Derby: Painter of Light, London and New York, 1968, I, p. 217, no. 121; II, p. 12, pl. 24). The frame for the Doncaster picture, made by the Huguenot framemaker, John Dubourg, with whom Wright had an account, would appear to compare closely with the frame on the present painting. This painting can be dated stylistically to c. 1760, when Wright had just left the studio of Hudson.