Thomas Gainsborough, 'The Painter's Daughters with a Cat', probably about 1760-1

The Painter's Daughters with a Cat

Thomas Gainsborough

Room 34

About the work

Overview

This portrait of Gainsborough’s daughters is likely to have been painted in Bath a year or so after the family moved there in late 1759. Mary appears to be about ten or eleven years old, and Margaret about eight or nine. Margaret leans her forehead back against her sister’s cheek as she holds their barely sketched-in cat, while Mary wraps her arms around her little sister, partly to help her with the writhing cat – whose tail she appears to pull – but also in a moving gesture of tenderness. No other portrait of this date conveys so strongly the sense that it is painted from life.

Although the faces have been painted, most of the picture is unfinished. The feathery pattern of gold, blue and grey brushstrokes that surrounds the girls seems to suggest storm clouds, sun and woodland.

In-depth

Gainsborough is known to have painted six double portraits of his daughters Mary and Margaret, as well as separate portraits of each of them, between about 1756 and 1770. The Painters Daughter’s chasing a Butterfly is probably the earliest of these double portraits. The Painter’s Daughters with a Cat is likely to have been painted in Bath a year or so after the family moved there in late 1759.

Here, Mary appears to be about ten or eleven years old, and Margaret about eight or nine. Margaret leans her head back against her sister’s shoulder as she cradles their cat in her arms. The sketched cat has been partly painted out with a different yellow than the one Gainsborough used for Mary’s dress. This may have been to make it less distracting when it became clear the painting would never be finished. Mary rests her cheek against Margaret’s forehead, her arms wrapped around her sister, partly to help her with the writhing cat – whose tail she appears to pull – but also, it seems, with love and protection for her little sister. Their father captures this moving gesture of tenderness.

After priming his canvas, Gainsborough drew the subject in white chalk or pastel, working swiftly and directly on the pinkish-brown ground. The cat held in Margaret’s clasped hands is very lightly sketched in dark brushstrokes. Expressive, fluid touches of paint build up the forms with colour, light and dark rather than with line. Although the faces have been painted, most of the picture is left unfinished. The feathery pattern of gold, blue and grey brushstrokes that surrounds the girls seems to suggest storm clouds, sun and woodland, creating a decorative backdrop that feels emotionally charged, atmospheric and timeless.

Gainsborough paints his daughters in attitudes that are natural to them and familiar to him. No other portrait of this date conveys so strongly the sense that it is painted from life. The result is very different from Gainsborough’s commissioned portraits of children whom he did not know so well. In those paintings he expresses children’s youthful charm, social confidence and financial security. In The Painter’s Daughters with a Cat, Gainsborough observes his own daughters with a moving insight that comes from knowing them intimately and understanding their vulnerability.

A lithograph of the picture was published by Richard Lane in about 1827 after Mary’s death. It reverses the image and emphasises the children’s vulnerability with the invented title The Orphans. The cat has been omitted and the sketchy details completed in such a way that much of the moving naturalism of Gainsborough’s original painting has been lost.

Key facts

Details

Full title: The Painter's Daughters with a Cat
Artist: Thomas Gainsborough
Artist dates: 1727 - 1788
Date made: probably about 1760-1
Medium and support: oil on canvas
Dimensions: 75.6 × 62.9 cm
Acquisition credit: Bought, 1923
Inventory number: NG3812
Location: Room 34
Collection: Main Collection
Frame: 18th-century English Frame

Provenance

Passed after the deaths of Gainsborough and his wife to their younger daughter, Margaret (d. 1820), who bequeathed a life-interest in her property to her elder sister Mary (d. 1826), the property to be divided thereafter between the three daughters of Gainsborough’s sister, Mrs Susannah Gardiner, or their heirs; inherited in 1827 by Susannah Gardiner’s grandson, Revd Gainsborough Gardiner (d. 1869), then by his son Revd Edward R. Gardiner; passed to the widow of Edward Netherton Harward, Gainsborough’s great-great-nephew, by whom sold Christie’s 11 May 1923 (101), bt Knoedler (3045 guineas), from whom purchased by the National Gallery 1923.

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.

Exhibition history

2018

Gainsborough's Family Album

National Portrait Gallery (London)

22 November 2018 - 3 February 2019

Princeton University Art Museum

23 February 2019 - 9 June 2019
2022

Berührende Formen. Johann Gottfried Schadow

Alte Nationalgalerie (Berlin)

21 October 2022 - 19 February 2023

Bibliography

1923

W.T. Whitley, 'The Gainsborough Family Portraits', The Studio, 1923, pp. 162-7
1946

Davies, Martin, National Gallery Catalogues: British School, London 1946
1946

M. Davies, Paintings and Drawings on the Backs of National Gallery Pictures, London 1946
1953

E.K. Waterhouse, Painting in Britain 1530-1790, London 1953
1959

Davies, Martin, National Gallery Catalogues: British School, 2nd edn (revised), London 1959
1975

M. Levey, Gainsborough: The Painter's Daughters chasing a Butterfly (exh. cat. The National Gallery, 9 October - 23 November 1975), London 1975
1991

D. Tyler, 'Thomas Gainsborough's Daughters', Gainsborough's House Society Annual Report, 1991, pp. 50-66
1998

J. Egerton, The British School, London 1998
2000

Egerton, Judy, National Gallery Catalogues: The British Paintings, revised edn, London 2000
2001

C. Baker and T. Henry, The National Gallery: Complete Illustrated Catalogue, London 2001
2022

S. Avery-Quash and A. Lepine (eds), Fruits of the Spirit: Art from the Heart, London 2022

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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