George Romney

Painted for the sitter, Mrs. Elizabeth Charnock, London, 1795;

Probably by whom sent to her parents, John and Henrietta Parish, Hamburg;

Arthur Sanderson, Edinburgh, by 1897;

By whom anonymously sold ("The Property of a Gentleman in Scotland"), London, Christie's, 3 July 1908, lot 85;

Where acquired by "Fischoff";

With Sedelmeyer Gallery, Paris, 1913;

T. J. Blakeslee, New York;

From whom acquired by T. B. Walker, Minneapolis, 1912;

Walker Art Center, Minneapolis;

By whom deacessioned ("The Property of The Walker Art Center"), New York, Parke-Bernet, 21 April 1971, lot 187;

Where acquired by John and Johanna Bass, New York;

By whom bequeathed to the Bass Museum of Art, Miami Beach, in 1978 (inv. no. 79.320).

C. Monkhouse, "A Northern Art Patron II - The British Portraits," in Art Journal (February 1897), pp. 35-36, reproduced;

T.H. Ward and W. Roberts, Romney: A Biographical and Critical Essay with a Catalogue Raisonne of his Works, London/New York 1904, vol. I, p. 74; vol. II, p. 28;

The John and Johanna Bass Collection at Miami Beach, Miami 1973, cat. no. 320;

K. Garlick, in Paintings and Textiles of the Bass Museum of Art: Selections from the Collection, M. Russell (ed.), Miami 1990, p. 70, reproduced;

A. Kidson, George Romney: A complete catalogue of his paintings, New Haven/London 2015, vol. I, p. 123, cat. no. 230, reproduced. 

Paris, Galerie Sedelmeyer, 12th Series of 100 Paintings by Old Masters, 1913, no. 96;

St. Paul, Minnesota, St. Paul Institution, April 1920;

Miami, Center for the Fine Arts, British Portraits from the Collection of the Bass Museum of Art, 1993-1994.

Mrs. Elizabeth Charnock was the daughter of John Parish, a Hamburg merchant, and his wife Henrietta. She married John Charnock, with whom she had a daughter in 1800, and was later remarried to Thomas Hamilton of Gilkerzcleugh at Rossie Castle, Montrose in 1807. 

Painted in 1795, her portrait was recorded as having been sent from the Romney's home studio in Cavendish Square, London to Hamburg, suggesting that it was probably a gift to the sitter’s parents. Mrs. Charnock, who paid Romney’s 70-guinea fee herself, also commissioned a portrait of her older sister, Mrs. Henrietta Ross (private collection, Glos).¹ In 1897, poet and art critic Cosmo Monkhouse wrote of the present portrait: “The painting is masterly, the colour pure, delicate, and sweet and the drapery painted with that slight and lovely dexterity which is always a mark of a fine Romney,”.²

¹ A. Kidson 2015, vol. II, pp. 506-507, cat. no. 1131, reproduced).

² C. Monkhouse 1897, p. 35.