Property of a Lady. A three-quarter length portrait of Anne...

1/2

Estimate

£80,000 - £120,000

Fees

Property of a Lady.

A three-quarter length portrait of Anne, Lady Russell, later Countess of Bedford (1615-1684), in a blue dress. Attributed to Sir Anthony Van Dyck.

Anne Carr, Lady Russell, an esteemed beauty was clearly a favourite of Sir Anthony Van Dyck. There are six portrait types of Lady Russell listed in Miller, et al. It is tempting to associate the current portrait with the three-quarter length in blue in the Egremont collection at Petworth House (Millar IV.22) because of the similarity of colouring. However, we believe that this picture represents a different portrait type, and most likely derives from a separate sitting. The comparison with the short three-quarter length belonging to the Tokyo Fuji Art Museum, Tokyo (Millar IV.23), is telling. The heads are essentially the same, though the pose and the colouring of the portraits are quite different. The Japanese painting features a rose-red gown and a fawn stole, possibly darker than in this painting. This comparison also illustrates Van Dyck's ability to develop different compositions from a single sitting.

Dr. Malcolm Rogers CBE FSA believes this painting to be an unfinished work by the artist:

"with, as you might expect, preparatory work by a member of his studio. Especially encouraging is the penumbra of thicker paint around the lady's head which is a recognised feature associated with the artist's ad vivum rendering of heads. My notes do not mention a similar penumbra in the Tokyo painting, though the painting is throughout of very high quality. There are one or two slight pentimenti in the silhouette of the figure of your painting and in the line of her stole, which at one point may have been intended to run over her right wrist. Close examination may reveal more. Some areas of the draperies, especially the linens are not fully realised, and, of course, the background is only roughed in.

Millar suggests that the Tokyo painting with its loose gown and protective hands may indicate that the sitter is pregnant. The gown is similarly loose in [this] painting. If she is indeed pregnant this might suggest a date around 1638 or 1639, in which years the first two of her eleven children were born. I cannot explain why the painting was left unfinished, but it is, must be, a distinct possibility that this is the very portrait of Lady Bedford that remained in Van Dyck's studio at the time of his death (see C. Brown and N. Ramsay, 'Van Dyck's Collection: Some New Documents', Burlington Magazine, Vol. 132, pp. 704-9)."

We are immensely grateful to Dr. Malcolm Rogers CBE FSA.

Dimensions:
53 1⁄8 in (H) x 43 1⁄4 in (W)

Provenance:

Picture probably listed in contents of van Dyck’s studio at time of death December 1641 (O. Millar, Van Dyck, A complete catalogue of the paintings, New Haven and London, 2004, under no. IV.23);