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| Lady Elizabeth Stanley (1753–1797), Countess of Derby |
Artist:George Romney (British, Beckside, Lancashire 1734–1802 Kendal, Cumbria)
Date:1776–78
Medium:Oil on canvas
Dimensions:50 x 40 in. (127 x 101.6 cm)
Classification:Paintings
Credit Line:The Jules Bache Collection, 1949
Accession Number:49.7.57
On November 27, 1776, Lady Derby first sat for this portrait. She returned to Romney's London studio ten times in the winters of 1777 and 1778. She was twenty-three with a son and had been married for two and a half years. The romantic background and her white dress are typical of Romney's portraits of women.
Catalogue Entry
Lady Elizabeth Hamilton was the only daughter of James, sixth Duke of Hamilton and Brandon, and his wife, née Elizabeth Gunning, one of the eighteenth century’s most famous beauties. In 1774 Lady Elizabeth married Edward Smith Stanley (1752–1834), who in 1776 succeeded his grandfather as twelfth Earl of Derby. The countess soon had three children: Edward (1775–1851, later the thirteenth Earl), Charlotte (1776–1805), and Elizabeth Henrietta (died 1857). In 1778 Lady Derby left her husband for John Frederick Sackville, third Duke of Dorset, who is believed to have been the father of her younger daughter. No divorce was granted and the children remained with Lord Derby. The countess subsequently lived in exile or in the country and finally died in 1797 after a long illness.
Romney recorded twelve sittings for this portrait between November 27, 1776, and May 4, 1778 (see Ward and Roberts 1904). The sitter herself paid for it on January 28, 1779. It was engraved by John Dean in 1780. The surface of the painting has a silky liquidity, smoothness, and slight transparency. The white gown and lack of jewelry are typical of Romney's portraits of women. The figured-damask underskirt here is beautifully painted.
Angelika Kauffmann painted Lady Derby with her husband and their infant son (MMA 59.189.2), and the earl also commissioned a full-length portrait of his wife from Reynolds that must have been begun about the same time as Romney’s but was finished more quickly, since it was exhibited at the Royal Academy in 1777. The Reynolds portrait, later destroyed by its owner after his wife left him, is known only from a mezzotint engraving by William Dickinson of 1780. Shortly after his first wife's death, the earl married the actress Elizabeth Farren, who is the subject of one of Sir Thomas Lawrence’s finest works (MMA 50.135.5).
Copyright Image
https://images.metmuseum.org
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