Women in Masquerade and Other Portraits from Cowdray Park

Nicholas White, Director of British Pictures, talks to Alex Baker about the histories and characters of the sitters in the remarkable collection of British portraits from Cowdray Park.

Alex Baker: Who was Lord Cowdray?

Nicholas White: Weetman Pearson, 1st Viscount Cowdray, was one of the great men of his age. He was a true entrepreneur who made an enormous fortune by turning his family business into a global engineering concern. He was clearly an astute collector who had a deep interest in portraiture, British portraiture in particular. In collaboration with his wife, Lady Pearson, he formed a remarkable collection of great portraits, of which five will be offered at Christie’s King Street on 5 July.

Can you tell us about Frances Howard, the sitter in Marcus Gheeraerts’ exquisitely detailed portrait?

Frances Howard, Countess of Hertford and later Duchess of Lennox and Richmond, was a member of the great Howard dynasty. She was a cousin of Queen Elizabeth I, as well as Henry Howard, Earl of Northampton and Thomas Howard, Earl of Suffolk.

Born in 1578, she was orphaned at the age of three. At the age of thirteen, she made her first marriage, to Henry Pranell, a wealthy vintner. Although this marriage was of great financial benefit to Frances, it displeased Lord Burghley, who, on behalf of Queen Elizabeth, watched over the activities of her cousins. On 8 February 1592, Henry Pranell wrote a letter of apology for the marriage to Lord Burghley which is preserved among Burghley’s state papers.

Frances was a very young bride – was it a happy marriage?

Pranell’s business led him to travel abroad, and we know that Frances fell in love with the Earl of Southampton, at one point even consulting the London astrologer and physician Dr. Forman to learn if she was pregnant. Pranell died in December 1599; Frances inherited his property and went into a year of mourning.

At the close of the year, Frances found herself the object of attention of many suitors – she was a rich and beautiful twenty-one year old. She chose to marry Edward Seymour, 1st Earl of Hertford who was forty years older, but promised significant social and financial advantages. Rejected suitors were left distraught: Sir George Rodney wrote to her in his own blood threatening suicide. When Frances responded with a witty Answer of 160 lines of verse, he carried out his threat.

Gheeraerts’ portrait was painted some years into this second marriage. What had changed for Frances?

Although the Howards were one of the dominant families in Tudor and Jacobean England, they went from periods of power to periods of near total eclipse. They had been significant players in the reign of Henry VIII and at the outset of Elizabeth I’s reign, but they suffered very seriously with the execution of the 4th Duke of Norfolk, and were still out of favour at the time of Frances’ birth.

When King James I ascended to the throne in 1603, Frances Howard’s cousins moved once more to the forefront of politics. They had been active in supporting the succession of James I, who was also conscious of how much they had suffered for his mother Mary, Queen of Scots. Frances, Countess of Hertford, became a popular figure at court – and James I visited the Hertfords at their house in Wiltshire three times.

What is the significance of her costume?

It is an extraordinarily elaborate masquerade dress. The level of detail that the artist managed to convey is amazing. Gheeraerts was one of the most sophisticated artists operating in England at the time – he’d risen to prominence during the reign of Elizabeth I, of whom he painted several significant portraits, and had successfully adapted to the new reign and become the favourite painter of Queen Anne of Denmark, James I’s Queen. One of the principal aspects of a portraitist was the ability to convey the status of a sitter, and this was most readily done by being able to record and detail the elaborate costumes, jewellery and indeed carpet that the sitter is portrayed with. The dress was for a masque – look at the trim of her petticoat, the spangles would have danced as she moved, shimmering in the light.

It is impossible not to fall for Gainsborough’s portrait of Mrs. William Villebois – who was the sitter?

Mrs. William Villebois is the granddaughter of Sir Benjamin Truman, who was one of the greatest businessmen of his age, a celebrated brewer, but also a great patron of Gainsborough. In all, he commissioned three full length portraits of his family – this is the only one left in private hands. That of him is in the Tate, and it’s one of Gainsborough’s most sympathetic portraits.  The other was of Mrs. Villebois’ younger sister, Henrietta Read, later Mrs. Meares (now in the Huntington Art Gallery in San Marino). All were commissioned in the mid-1770s, and are a magnificent series of portraits.

Does this share that sympathy with the portrait of Sir Benjamin Truman?

What’s fantastic about this portrait is that it’s well preserved, it’s beautifully observed, and the dress in particular is ravishing, heavily impastoed and astonishingly realised by Gainsborough in broad brave strokes that result in an electric performance. It is the most impressive female full length portrait to appear at auction in a generation.

Besides his own portrait, why did Sir Benjamin Truman commission pictures of his granddaughters from Gainsborough?

The commission was connected with his plans for the family business – he commissioned these portraits when the succession of the business was dependent on the heirs that he was to have through his granddaughter. They were then hung at his country house at Popes in Hertfordshire, and in his will he stipulated that they should be removed to his house in London until such time that one of his great-grandchildren could take over the running of business. The series of portraits was an expression of his dynastic ambitions.

Later on Mrs. Villebois and her husband commissioned an additional portrait by Gainsborough of their children, on whom Sir Benjamin had pinned his dynastic hopes.

The dress is exquisite, but it doesn’t look contemporary.

She’s in a dress that is loosely based on 17th century fashions. It would have been worn in the context of masquerades that would have been popular in the 1770s, so it may have been a dress that Mrs. Villebois wore on specific occasions. However, Gainsborough was probably conscious of giving his portraits a timeless element, which he accentuated by putting his sitter in a dress that isn’t linked to a specific historical moment.

The mode for hair worn high reached its peak in the 1770s - it was a fashion set by Georgiana, Duchess of Devonshire. The elegant ostrich feather the surmounts her hairstyle is exquisite.

What is the history of the painting?

This is the first time it has appeared at public auction. It descended in Mrs. Villebois’ family until the late 19th century. Since it was sold by Mrs. Villebois’ descendants it has been in two great collections, first that of Alfred de Rothschild, and that of the 1st Viscount Cowdray, who bought it for the enormous sum of £49,500. This full length portrait has always been recognised as a particularly appealing example of Thomas Gainsborough’s female portraiture.

And tell us a little about the other pictures offered from Cowdray Park.

Robert Peake’s Portrait of Sir William Pope is one of the most impressive portraits by the greatest English portrait painter at the court of King James I. Sir Thomas Pope, William’s uncle, had established a fortune at the time of the dissolution of the monasteries. He was deeply charitable, and established Trinity College, Oxford. Sir William would become the 1st Earl of Downe in 1628.

A fascinating portrait of the wife and two children of Sir William’s heir, also Sir William Pope, is offered. The portrait celebrates the lineage and descent of the Pope family, with the Countess of Downe indicating the course of succession with a gentle hand laid upon her eldest son’s head.

The Portrait of the Earl of Morton by Sir William Beechey is another portrait to be offered from Cowdray Park in the Old Master and British Paintings sale. He is shown in the uniform of the Royal Company of Archers.