Portrait study of Mrs Shute Barrington (d. 1807), three-quarter-length, seated with her elbow resting on a book

The present drawing is a previously unrecorded study for the portrait of Mrs Shute Barrington, Cummer Gallery of Art, Jacksonville, Florida. The sitter, the daughter of Sir John Guise, Bt., married The Hon. Shute Barrington, then Bishop of Llandaff and subsequently Bishop of Salisbury and then Durham 1791-1826. The painting is dated 1808 and this drawing seems to confirm that it is more likely that the picture was painted posthumously rather than, as has been previously thought, the date being added after the addition of the background details of the towers of Durham Cathedral (H. von Erffa and A. Staley, The Paintings of Benjamin West, New Haven and London, 1986, p. 488, no. 589).

We are grateful to Allen Staley for his help in preparing this catalogue entry.