The Gainsborough Hat

Painted around 1780, this stylish young lady reads the latest novel as she sits on a Hepplewhite style chair beside a small pedestal table placed by a window with a pastoral landscape view beyond. The artist has cleverly used the window to introduce light and perspective to this striking portrait.

Fashionably dressed, the lady wears an open robe in powder blue with a panelled skirt and a buckled ribbon belt. The long narrow sleeves have pearly buttons on the cuffs and the low décolletage is covered with a diaphanous fichu, the ends tucked into the neckline at the front. She has accessorised her dress with a single pink rose on her corsage, pearl drop earrings with a matching pearl necklace, and a sepia memorial or love token brooch pinned to her fichu. Her voluminous unpowdered hair has been curled and is topped with a striking ‘picture’ hat trimmed with powder blue and white ribbons. These wide-brimmed hats were immortalised by Gainsborough’s portrait of Georgiana, Duchess of Devonshire.

Painted in oil on canvas laid on board, the painting has surface craquelure but is otherwise fine and without paint loss. The oval portrait is presented with a decorative mount within a period giltwood frame with a piecrust border. The artist’s trade label is affixed reverse –

SMITH
Portrait Painter in Oil / Printseller & Picture Frame Maker
No. 40, Oxford Street / the corner of Newman Street
Miniature Portraits and Profiles &c

Despite being an accomplished artist, there are few details recorded on Smith. He has been listed erroneously in some reference works as James Smith but new evidence suggests he was actually named William. In 1787 William Smith took out an insurance policy with Sun Fire Office for his premises at 40 Oxford Street, the address used on this artist’s trade labels. A William Smith, who may be the same artist, exhibited three miniature portraits at the Royal Academy in 1774 from an address in nearby Berwick Street.