Completed Dress and Textiles, Portraits: British 16th and 17th C 54 Who painted 'The Countess of Ossory' and can we confirm the sitter?

The Collection has commented: ‘We are not familiar enough with the artist to comment on the difference in style, as they are very different and we can’t quite see the same hand in both. To our eyes it doesn’t seem quite vibrant enough to be Lely either.’

This looks like Willem Wissing.
The hands and ars in particular are painted with less anatomical form than Lely.
The background and the leaves in Particular, are typical of Wissing.

Prints after paintings of the Countess of Ossory by Wissing and Lely:

https://bit.ly/3f5cLqS

https://bit.ly/3fBavGR

Our lady looks like a different person.

Amelia of Nassau, Countess of Ossory (1635–1688) was never the Duchess of Ormond. She married Thomas Butler (1634-1680), 6th Earl of Ossory, at the Hague on the 17th November 1659, and he died in 1680. His father was James Butler (1610 - 1688), 5th Earl of Ossory and 1st Duke of Ormond, who died eight years after his son. His wife was Elizabeth Preston (1615–1684), 1st Duchess of Ormond and 2nd Baroness Dingwall. The title of Duke of Ormond thus skipped a generation and passed to the first Duke's grandson, James Butler (1665 - 1745), 7th Earl of Ossory and 2nd Duke of Ormond, the son of the above-mentioned Thomas Butler and Amelia of Nassau.

Jacinto's second link above is actually to a 1702 mezzotint print showing Mary Butler (née Somerset) (1665 - 1733), Duchess of Ormond, the second wife of the above-mentioned James Butler, the 2nd Duke of Ormond, whom she married on the 3rd of August 1685, as engraved and published by John Smith, after the portrait by Sir Godfrey Kneller:

https://bit.ly/3vfUT28

and

https://www.britishmuseum.org/collection/term/BIOG143782

Thank you, Kieran. My link, of course, misidentifies both the sitter and the painter, but I should have realised the dress and hair are too late for Lely and are, in fact, Queen Anne period.

It may be that Lely did not paint Amelia of Nassau, though Wissing certainly did, at least twice. My faulty link, albeit using the wrong image, was apparently referring to a print after Lely by Thomas Watson purportedly of Amelia, Countess of Ossory (and inscribed as such), even though it is really of Mary Bagot, Countess of Falmouth and Dorset (the original picture is in the Royal Collection). I can post links to both the print and the painting, but I do not want to make matters even more confusing.

There is a flower to the right of our sitter's head.Beneath the grime perhaps some more. Could it possibly be an Orange flower-or Oranje Blumen as they say in the Netherlands.
If so -possibly someone of the House of Orange-perhaps even Queen Mary herself?

Would it be possible for Art UK to post a higher resolution of the building in the distance, behind the sitter's right elbow?

The building is a castle with obvious crenellation, seen upon enlargement.

Kieran, this is the best I can do, but am also asking the Collection about this one as it is quite a small-sized image. David

Here is a similar portrait by Wissing:

https://bit.ly/3wwddo0

If this is the Countess of Ossary, or any member of the relevant branch of the Butler family, the crenellated image could be the left hand side of the formal entrance to Kilkenny Castle, former home of the Dukes of Ormond.

Ossory!

While I still favor Wissing over Lely, it may not be autograph Wissing but "studio of," circle of" or "style of" Wissing.

The painting could be by or from the circle of Kneller's one-time student Michael Dahl (1659–1743), the artist being in the habit of including delicate sprigs of flowers in many of his portraits of female sitters. Dahl also painted James Butler, 2nd Duke of Ormond.

If this is the Countess of Ossory, who died in 1688, it is unlikely to be by Dahl, whose London career did not take off until the 1690s. This picture looks more like Wissing's work to me.

If it is her is the relevant question. On what firm evidence was the attribution made to it being a portrait of the Countess of Ossory? Did Lady Wakefield present it as a family heirloom? If so, where was the connection between the Wakefields and the Butlers? Osmund, might you know?

I assume Lady Wakefield was Sarah Frances Graham, the wife of Charles Wakefield (d. 1941), who was Lord Mayor of London 1915-1916 and became the 1st Viscount Wakefield in 1934. He did not come from a noble family, so this picture would not have been of one of his ancestors. I do not know anything about the background of his wife.

I meant to say that the Countess of Ossory in question would presumably not have been one of his ancestors.

I think that there is much confusion around which Countess of Ossory is which. For instance, the supposed portrait of her in the Royal Collection is credited as having been painted by William Wissing (1656-1687) in c.1683, the year in which the artist was 27 years old and Amelia of Nassau (1635–1688), Countess of Ossory, was 48 years old. The portrait, however, shows a much younger girl, perhaps one in her twenties or early thirties:

http://www.rct.uk/collection/402575/amelia-of-nassau-countess-of-ossory-d-1688

Could she be 48 in the portrait?

Amelia of Nassau was known as a beauty, at least in her younger days, and perhaps she aged uncommonly well. It is also quite possible that Wissing flattered her. I have recently been wondering about the degree to which a portrait painter may flatter a sitter, in connection to a lovely portrait of one of Handel's leading prima donnas, who was notoriously ugly by contemporary accounts (to the point she was nicknamed The Pig). The portrait in question gives no hint of that.

If you read the blurb on the RCT Wisssing -it says it was painted in Holland when he was there with Queen Mary,and was not catalogued till Queen Anne.
I suggest all three paintings. The RCT, Jacinto's Wissing and our sitter here are all by Wissing, all of the same Lady, and I think that Lady is Queen Mary,Princess of Orange. Now I duck whilst you all dissagree :-) .

Louis, I think we have to trust the Royal Collection as to what is or is not a portrait of a well-known princess/Queen. Such a determination is rather more in its field of expertise than ours.

For reference, here is Wissing's Mary as Princess of Orange:

https://bit.ly/3oW7qFK

While the five-petalled white flower at upper right, already noted by Louis, might be a generic flower, it could certainly be an orange blossom, and thus used to signify the sitter's ancestry if this is Amelia of Nassau. The latter's father was the illegitimate son of Maurice, Prince of Orange, and thus she was obviously related to the House of Orange-Nassau, albeit collaterally.

I suppose one could consider John Riley as the painter, but the picture still feels more like Lely by way of Wissing or circle of Wissing.

The attached appeared in The Illustrated London News of the 2nd October 1943.

More on Sir Charles Wakefield can be read here:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_Wakefield,_1st_Viscount_Wakefield

Lady Wakefield was born Sarah Frances Graham on the 27th November 1858 in Liverpool, the daughter of William Graham (1826 - 1870) and Elizabeth Sinker (1832 - 1923). She married Charles Cheers Wakefield in 1891 in West Derby, Lancashire and died, as Viscountess Wakefield of Hythe, at The White Cottage, Blackhouse Hill, Hythe, Kent, on the 17th February 1950, leaving an estate valued at £375,061/10/10, equivalent to circe £11,700,000 today.

Jacinto-refering to your link of RCT Queen Mary. I see many similiarities in the face to our sitter.-- though the dressing/clothes are obviously "Qeenlike"and she wears make up,I stiill think it is the same person. The RCT blurb mentions that portraits were constantly updated ,as theirs was.I think the RCT Queen Mary was the end product of a series. Just my view. Cheers.

Louis, you may keep your opinion, but I rather doubt you will find much support for it. If nothing else, our picture is much too casual or informal to be of Mary. I am reminded of a carved figure of a Buddhist acolyte on Art UK listed by the the corresponding collection as a figure of Buddha, which was quite implausible based on iconography, but there you are.

Hard to make out from the photo, could do with a high-res, but has an air of Thomas Murray about it.

If the sitter is Amelia of Nassau (d. 1688), this may be too early for Murray, who was only 25 when she died and working under John Riley, whose studio he took over when Riley died in 1691.

If not Murray perhaps Wilhelm Sonmans

I've asked the collection if there's any chance of obtaining a better image and some detail shots.

I have become more inclined to favor John Riley or a follower over Wissing. The latter was better at painting women, and tended to make his sitters look pretty and elegantly delicate. Our picture is less flattering and more matter-of-fact, which is more the style of Riley (who was more successful with men and more prone to have male sitters). Here are some comparable portraits by or in the style of Riley:

https://bit.ly/3ygOfKH

https://bit.ly/3fjAh3c

https://bit.ly/3rLwu3p

Can a costume historian help us? My feeling is that this is a painting of the 1680s. If it is later that rules out Wissing and as Jacinto has noted Riley died in 1691.
Can we find closely comparable disposal of the hands to those here?

It's not as easy as that, I fear. It is my understanding that the costume is in the semi-imaginary déshabillé manner pioneered by Lely as a way of avoiding having to take the time to painstakingly depict the intricacies of actual dress. The hair may be an exact depiction.

Perhaps 1690s?

I think the hair could be 1680s to 1710 or so, but the overall feel is more latter 17th C than early 18th to me. Perhaps Lou Taylor could help. As for artist, we may have to settle for British School. Maybe Group Leader Rab MacGibbon could venture an opinion.

are we looking at two bites at the cherry? What was the practice on the deaths of these two artists with unfinished pictures? In case of the very productive Wissing there may have been made. Did others have finished portraits, heads in particular? were costume specialists involved?

I'm new to this discussion which flourished in summer 2021 before Martin revived it yesterday.

Wissing as an artist is harder and brighter than our portrait. And I hesitate over the Riley suggestion. Other names have been put forward and are worth exploring: Murray and Sonmans.

Murray is probably more worth while than Sonmans. Are there aticles on either?

The type of head in some of Murray's early eighteenth century portraits of women make one wonder if the head was painted onto an unfinished painting of the late 1680s and 1690s - see for instance his 1717 portrait of Lady Mary Booth . For the costume surely could not be lter than the 1690s

Martin, I doubt we can use the dress here to arrive at precise dating, but the picture does feel more latter 17th C than early 18th (which is, of course, a subjective opinion). Thomas Murray is plausible; he was Riley's pupil, and his portrait of Mary Booth https://bit.ly/3A21Ckm is closer to ours than Sonmans https://bit.ly/3L5Rqxk , who seems closer to Wissing.

Sonmans apparently worked primarily for academic institutions, which again makes Murray a better candidate (unless, of course, our sitter was connected to a college or university).

I suppose one could consider an early work by Jonathan Richardson, who was also Riley's pupil, but we still wind up with "circle of Riley."

Can one find a similar Rubensian squire in any of these portraits?

Marion, the collection was asked if it could provide a better image and some detail shots two years ago. Evidently that did not happen, so could it be asked anew?

It may well be that this is not Amelia of Nassau, in which case we are unlikely to identify the sitter. That leaves the attribution, which could be British School if not circle of John Riley.

Yes, a previous contact was asked. I have renewed that request with our current contact.

Thank you to everyone for their comments and suggestions. The work is currently “view by appointment”, not on public display or in store. As a result photography or further examination including the reverse may not be possible. We don't have anything to suggest a different identity for the sitter has ever been proposed.
I wonder whether an alternative or simultaneous approach might be to consider the Wakefield connection - it was presented by Lady Wakefield following the death of Charles Wakefield in 1941.

The Wakefield provenance was considered and discussed above, but nothing came of it. Neither spouse was known to have noble ancestry, assuming the sitter was of noble blood. The title of (1st) Viscount Wakefield dates from 1934.

Given the circumstances, I repeat my suggestion to consult Lou Taylor regarding dating (based primarily on the hair) and to ask Group Leader Rab MacGibbon for his opinion on the artist.

Both group leaders are aware of this discussion, though I would not expect any immediate replies during the holiday period in August.

Like others, I doubt the identification of the sitter as the Countess of Ossory having checked out NPG files.

As to the artist I think Bendor's suggestion (31/05/2021) of Thomas Murray is closest to the mark although difficult to be certain about. Attached please see a portrait, Sir Edward Smyth, 3rd Bt, by Thomas Murray, signed and dated lower right 1699 (sold at Sotheby's 13.7.1994 lot 26). Similar composition and feel. Also attached is a detail of the flower at right.

I would suggest "Portrait of a Lady" and style of Thomas Murray.

I suppose the picture could be "attributed to" Thomas Murray, depending on the collection's preference.