George Romney 1734-1802

Grosvenor Gallery, A Century of British Art from 1737 to 1837, 1888, no.148;

Royal Academy, Winter Exhibition, 1891, no.40;

Grafton Galleries, Fair Women, 1894, no. 117;

Grafton Galleries, A Special Selection from the Works of George Romney, 1900, no.15;

Royal Academy, British Art, 1934, no.338;

Iveagh Bequest, Kenwood, George Romney, 1961, no.23;

Leger Galleries, George Romney as a Painter of Children, 30th May-30th June 1984, no.6

The Rev. John Romney, Memoirs of the Life and Works of George Romney, 1830, p.132;

Catalogue of the Furniture, Porcelain, Pictures & c. at Camelford House, Park Lane, The Town Residence of Lord Hillingdon, compiled 1891, privately printed, p.45 (in the Red Drawing Room);

Hilda Gamlin, Romney and his Art, 1894, p.134;

Sir Herbert Maxwell, George Romney, 1902, p.172, no.50;

George Paston, George Romney, 1903, p.192;

H. Ward and W. Roberts, Romney, 1904, Vol.II, p.26;

Arthur B. Chamberlain, George Romney, 1910, pp.247, 279, 311, 339, and 380;

E.K. Waterhouse, Painting in Britain 1530-1790, 1953, p.187;

G.C. Rump, George Romney, 1974, Vol.I, pp.75-6; Vol.II, pl.21;

David A. Cross, A Striking Likeness, The Life of George Romney, 2000, pp.85, 110, 132-133, illus. pl.40

Engraved:

Mezzotint by J.R. Smith, 1781

Painted circa 1775, this exquisite portrait is said to have been the first picture that Romney completed after his return from Italy. Romney had arrived in Italy in 1773, and he spent the following two years in 'strenuous labour and high intellectual delight' (The Rev. John Romney, op. cit., p.96). Romney was seduced by Italy's classical heritage, in particular the work of Raphael. Using an introduction from the Duke of Gloucester, Romney sought permission to erect scaffolding in the Vatican to copy several heads from The Expulsion of Heliodorus from the Temple. Romney also copied a group of figures from the School of Athens, in the Stanza della Segnatura in the Vatican, as well as the lower half of Raphael's Transfiguration in the church of San Pietro in Montorio. The composition of the present picture recalls Raphael's Madonna della Sedia, a work which Romney must have seen on his travels. The composition is assured with a mastery of anatomical detail, and shows his fascination with the Renaissance and the strong influence it had on him. The composition is very close to Romney's portrait of Mrs Richard Cumberland with her son, Charles, which is now in the Tate Gallery, and which Romney completed shortly before departing for Italy in 1772. Both compositions capture the intimacy of maternal love, but the portrait of Mrs Carwardine clearly dispays a greater maturity of style and technique.

The sitter was the daughter of Charles Holgate, of Earl's Colne Priory, Essex.  On 9th June 1771 she married the Rev. Thomas Carwardine (1734-1824), the son of John Carwardine of Thingehills Court, Hertfordshire. Carwardine had exhibited as a miniaturist at the Society of Artists in the 1760's, but on marrying money, he settled into a more comfortable life as both squire and rector of Earl's Colne Priory. He was a close friend of Romney who was godfather to their daughter Anne (b.1779) and a frequent visitor to their house. He was also a philanthropist and he re-established the grammar school in his village at his own expense. Romney painted his portrait in 1772.

Romney's role as godfather of Carwardine's daughter is of some significance since he almost entirely lacked a family life of his own, a fact which manifested itself in Romney's frequent depiction of children. Only two years after this portrait of Mrs Carwardine, Romney completed his portrait of The Gower Family, now in the Abbot Hall Art Gallery, Kendal. There is a tenderness in Romney's depictions of children. The guileless charms of youth allowed Romney to paint unburdoned by the need to endow each portrait with the characterisation and 'grace' so sought after by his older patrons. As he expressed in a letter to his friend, William Hayley, referring to the children of his landlord at the time: "I begin to feel the necessity of having these innocent little spirits about me, they give more soft delight to the mind than I can describe to soften the steps down declining life". Romney was to paint a number of other portraits of children over the course of the next ten years, but few capture the intimacy and the immediacy of the present work.