Image of Gallery in South Kensington
Request to view at the Prints & Drawings Study Room, level F , Case RMC, Shelf 7, Box K

Cupid making a bow

Miniature
12/05/1722 (made)
Artist/Maker
Place of origin

Sarah Stanley (born Sloane, ca. 1709-1764) was the eldest daughter of Sir Hans Sloane, the seventeenth-century physician and collector whose large collection formed the basis of the British Museum and the Natural History Museum. Sloane travelled to Jamaica and eventually married Elizabeth Langley Rose, the heiress to a Jamaican plantation, in 1695. Their fortune from Jamaica funded Sloane’s collecting. Sarah would have grown up in Sloane’s home, which was filled with art, plants, gemstones, coins, antiquities, and other curiosities and gave her unparalleled access to works of art. She began copying works in Sloane’s collection as a teenager—including portraits by Rosalba Carriera and Hilliard’s Unknown Man Clasping A Hand From A Cloud, now in the collection of the V&A. Her style suggests Stanley may have taken further lessons with the miniature painter Bernard Lens. This miniature was copied after Parmigianino's Cupid making a bow or a version of it available to Stanley.


Object details

Categories
Object type
TitleCupid making a bow (generic title)
Materials and techniques
Watercolour on vellum laid down on card
Brief description
Miniature, Cupid making a bow, by Sarah Stanley (born Sloane) after Parmigianino, watercolour on vellum, 1722
Physical description
Miniature painting on vellum laid down on card depicting Cupid making a bow, copy after Parmigianino
Dimensions
  • Height: 17.78cm
  • Width: 12.7cm
Taken from Victoria & Albert Museum Department of Prints and Drawings and Department of Paintings Accessions 1955-1956 London: HMSO 1963
Style
Marks and inscriptions
'S. Stanly: Fecit May: ye: 12: 1722' (Signed and dated)
Object history
Part of lot 1307 on the fourth day's sale (13 July 1955) at Paultons, Hants, formerly the property of Major R. C. Hans Sloane Stanley, a descendant of the artist who was herself the elder daughter of Sir Hans Sloane Bt., and married George Stanley in 1719. The sale also included portraits, drawings, and needlework by Stanley, including possibly a copy after Hilliard's Man Clutching a Hand in the Clouds (P.21-1942), a version of which was in Sloane's possession.

See note to P.50-1955. The prototype by Parmigianino is in the Kunst-historisches Museum, Vienna. Replicas, copies and engravings exist, and it may be from one of these that Sarah Stanley worked.
Subjects depicted
Associations
Summary
Sarah Stanley (born Sloane, ca. 1709-1764) was the eldest daughter of Sir Hans Sloane, the seventeenth-century physician and collector whose large collection formed the basis of the British Museum and the Natural History Museum. Sloane travelled to Jamaica and eventually married Elizabeth Langley Rose, the heiress to a Jamaican plantation, in 1695. Their fortune from Jamaica funded Sloane’s collecting. Sarah would have grown up in Sloane’s home, which was filled with art, plants, gemstones, coins, antiquities, and other curiosities and gave her unparalleled access to works of art. She began copying works in Sloane’s collection as a teenager—including portraits by Rosalba Carriera and Hilliard’s Unknown Man Clasping A Hand From A Cloud, now in the collection of the V&A. Her style suggests Stanley may have taken further lessons with the miniature painter Bernard Lens. This miniature was copied after Parmigianino's Cupid making a bow or a version of it available to Stanley.
Bibliographic references
  • Victoria and Albert Museum Department of Prints and Drawings and Department of Paintings Accessions 1955-1956 London: HMSO, 1963
  • Kim Sloan, Amateur Artists and Drawing Masters c. 1600-1800, London: British Museum Publications, 1999
Collection
Accession number
P.54-1955

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Record createdJune 30, 2009
Record URL
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