Sir John Lavery, R.A., R.H.A., R.S.A.

Christie's, Glasgow, 20 May 1987, lot 222;
de Veres, Dublin, 11 June 1996, lot 69;
Private collection

Original canvas. A faint abrasion left of the signature otherwise the work appears in good overall condition. Ultraviolet light reveals a small areas of retouching located: to her face, near centre of her dress, in background by her left arm, by base of her staff, and left of signature corresponding with above mentioned abrasion. Held in a composite frame.
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The identity of the sitter and exact significance of the present work continue to remain obscure. While the work is clearly autograph, the swift linear notation of the figure would tend to place it earlier than 1896. Comparison has been made with Lavery’s sketches at the Grand Costume Ball in Glasgow in 1889, but no similar occasion involving the artist is recorded for a year in which the painter was contemplating a permanent move from Glasgow to London, and attempting to secure portrait commissions on an extended period in Rome during which he became seriously unwell. A letter to Robert Macaulay Stevenson in July of that year indicates that he had not worked since the previous November. By 1898, this unstable phase of his career was over and he had successfully established himself in Kensington.

The Garlanded Girl however, despite its obvious echoes of Whistler, remains something of a mystery and we look in vain for comparable pictures at this date, while back in the Costume Ball an untraced canvas entitled A Corner of the Ballroom, indicates a figure with a garlanded staff and sash. While this woman is not the ‘garlanded girl’, she may be a similar vestal embodiment of spring.