Sir Joshua Reynolds, 'Anne, 2nd Countess of Albemarle', about 1760
About the work
Overview
Lady Anne, 2nd Countess of Albemarle, is approaching 60 in this portrait. She is the widow of William-Anne Keppel, 2nd Earl of Albemarle, with whom she had 15 children, although only four sons and two daughters survived childhood. She holds a shuttle and is engaged in ‘knotting’ – a pastime involving making knots in thread which could then be sewn as decoration onto other items. A pair of scissors and a workbasket lie on the table beside her. Her face is almost dead-white because the paint has been bleached by the light.
The idea that Lady Albemarle should be painted by Reynolds almost certainly came from her second son, Augustus Keppel, a Commodore in the Royal Navy whom Reynolds portrayed at least seven times. Lady Albemarle sat for Reynolds 11 times between 26 September 1757 and 28 June 1759 and the portrait was finished by 1760, although Reynolds was not paid for it for a further 12 years.
Key facts
Details
- Full title
- Anne, 2nd Countess of Albemarle
- Artist
- Sir Joshua Reynolds
- Artist dates
- 1723 - 1792
- Date made
- about 1760
- Medium and support
- oil on canvas
- Dimensions
- 126.5 × 101 cm
- Acquisition credit
- Bought, 1888
- Inventory number
- NG1259
- Location
- Room 34
- Collection
- Main Collection
Provenance
Additional information
Text extracted from the ‘Provenance’ section of the catalogue entry in Judy Egerton, ‘National Gallery Catalogues: The British Paintings’, London 2000; for further information, see the full catalogue entry.
Bibliography
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1743London, British Library, BL Add.MSS 32.701: Letters to the Duke of Newcastle, 1743
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1889National Gallery, Descriptive and Historical Catalogue of the Pictures in the National Gallery with Biographical Notices of the Painters: Foreign Schools, London 1889
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1899A. Graves and W.V. Cronin, A History of the Works of Sir Joshua Reynolds P.R.A., 4 vols, London 1899
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1907D. Singh, Norfolk Houses, Norwich 1907
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1937H. Walpole, Horace Walpole Correspondence, ed. W.S. Lewis, 48 vols, New Haven 1937
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1946Davies, Martin, National Gallery Catalogues: British School, London 1946
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1946M. Davies, Paintings and Drawings on the Backs of National Gallery Pictures, London 1946
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1949B. Fitzgerald, Correspondence of Emily Duchess of Leinster, Dublin 1949
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1959Davies, Martin, National Gallery Catalogues: British School, 2nd edn (revised), London 1959
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1966S. Groves, The History of Needlework Tools and Accessories, London 1966
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1968M. Cormack, 'The Ledgers of Sir Joshua Reynolds', The Walpole Society, XLII, 1970, pp. 105-69
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1976H. Potterton, Reynolds and Gainsborough, Themes and Painters in the National Gallery 2, London 1976
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1986D. Gordon, The National Gallery School of Painting: British Paintings, London 1986
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1987O. Baldwin and T. Wilson, 'Purcell's Knotting Song', Musical Times, 1987, pp. 379-81
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1994D. Saunders and J. Kirby, 'Light-Induced Colour Changes in Red and Yellow Lake Pigments', National Gallery Technical Bulletin, XV, 1994, pp. 79-97
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1998J. Egerton, The British School, London 1998
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2000Egerton, Judy, National Gallery Catalogues: The British Paintings, revised edn, London 2000
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2000D. Mannings, Sir Joshua Reynolds: A Complete Catalogue of His Paintings, New Haven 2000
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2001
C. Baker and T. Henry, The National Gallery: Complete Illustrated Catalogue, London 2001
About this record
If you know more about this painting or have spotted an error, please contact us. Please note that exhibition histories are listed from 2009 onwards. Bibliographies may not be complete; more comprehensive information is available in the National Gallery Library.
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