Portrait of Miss Harriet Powell (d.1779), afterwards Countess of Seaforth, half-length, in a white dress with a pink sash, a goldfinch perched on her left hand, as 'Leonora' in Bickerstaff's The Padlock

Details

Sir Joshua Reynolds, P.R.A. (1723-1792)
Portrait of Miss Harriet Powell (d.1779), afterwards Countess of Seaforth, half-length, in a white dress with a pink sash, a goldfinch perched on her left hand, as 'Leonora' in Bickerstaff's The Padlock
oil on canvas
30 x 25 in. (76.2 x 63.5 cm.)

Provenance

Probably Kenneth Mackenzie (1744-1781), 1st Earl of Seaforth.
Francis Humberston Mackenzie, the 1st Earl of Seaforth's brother, who was created Baron Seaforth, and by inheritance to his wife's cousin, Elizabeth Proby, and by inheritance to;
Mrs Evans, Chalcombe House, Banbury.
Anonymous sale, Sotheby's, London, 17 May 1967, lot 180, as 'after Reynolds' (£60 to Maunsell).
W.J. Goldsmith, Salisbury Hall, London Colney, near St. Albans, 1968.
Anonymous sale, Christie's, London, 20 June 1969, lot 165 (sold 1,900 guineas).
Anonymous sale, Christie's, London, 23 November 1984, lot 80 (sold £16,200).

Literature

A. Graves and W.V. Cronin, A History of the Works of Sir Joshua Reynolds P.R.A., London, 1899, II, p. 765.
T. Borenius and the Rev. J.V. Hodgson, A Catalogue of the Pictures at Elton Hall, 1924, p.7.
E.K. Waterhouse, Reynolds, London, 1941, p.95.
D. Mannings, Sir Joshua Reynolds: A Complete Catalogue of His Paintings, I, p.379, no.1464, vol.II, p.407, fig.984.

Engraved

Elizabeth Judkins, 1770.
R. Houston, 1771.
S.W. Reynolds.

Special notice

VAT rate of 5% is payable on hammer price plus buyer's premium.

Lot Essay

Harriet Powell was an actress and singer who married Kenneth Mackenzie (b.1744), created Viscount Fortrose (1766) and Earl of Seaforth (1771), as his second wife. Her husband was painted by Reynolds in the group of the Dilettanti Society (D. Mannings, op.cit I, p.167, no.511, II, fig.1237). He died on his passage to the East Indies with his regiment, the 78th Foot, in August 1781. This portrait was painted in 1769 and Reynolds recorded multiple appointments with the sitter that year.

The Padlock, a comic opera written by Isaac Bickerstaffe with music by Charles Dibdin, debuted at the Drury Lane Theatre, London, in 1768.

We are grateful to Hugh Belsey for his assistance with this catalogue entry.

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