Physical description
Portrait miniature of a woman, circular, half-length, in a carved frame with scrolling at the edges.
Place of Origin
England, Great Britain (painted)
Date
1596-1600 (painted)
Artist/maker
Oliver, Isaac, born 1558 - died 1617 (artist)
Materials and Techniques
Watercolour on vellum stuck to plain card
Marks and inscriptions
'IO'
'The Lady Frances Howard Countess of Essex and Somerset, by Isaac Oliver; from the collection of James West, president of the Royal Society, H. W. 1773.'
Dimensions
Diameter: 130 mm, Height: 214 mm frame (max), Width: 200 mm frame (max), Depth: 30 mm frame (max)
Descriptive line
Portrait miniature of an unknown woman, formerly called Frances Howard, Countess of Somerset, watercolour on vellum, painted by Isaac Oliver, 1596-1600.
Bibliographic References (Citation, Note/Abstract, NAL no)
Snodin, Michael, ed. Horace Walpole's Strawberry Hill. New Haven: Yale Center for British Art, 2009. xv, 368 p. : col. ill. ISBN: 978-0-300-12574-0.
Strong, Roy. Artists of the Tudor Court: the Portrait Miniature Rediscovered 1520-1620. London: The Victoria and Albert Museum, 1983.
Cat. 271, p. 163. Full Citation:
‘ISAAC OLIVER
271 Unknown Lady, 1596-1600, formerly called Frances Howard, Countess of Somerset
Victoria & Albert Museum (P.12-1971)
Vellum stuck to a plaing card, circular, 130 mm, 5 1/8 in. diam.
This miniature is one of Oliver’s largest and finest painted from life. From its first appearance at the close of the 18th century it was identified as Frances Howard, Countess of Essex and alter Countess of Somerset (1593-1632), the notorious beauty whose career came to an end at the discovery of her murder by poison of Sir Thomas Overbury. Her iconography is thin but the oil portrait that depict her do agree in terms of the grey eyes and fair hair. To be her, however, the costume would have to be not earlier than 1609, when, at sixteen, she took up her role in court life in Jonson’s Masque of Queens. Enveloping veils similar, but not identical, to these occur in pictures about 1615 (e.g. Gheeraerts Catherine Killigrew, Lady Jermyn, dated 1614, Strong, The English Icon, pl. 285 (no. 278)). This is deceptive for the real dating of the miniature depends on the dress beneath which can only be 1590’s. The line of the sleeves and outersleeves, with their narrow lace cuff and the farthingale, are paralleled exactly in the Ditchley Portrait of Elizabeth I, c. 1590-92 (ibid, p. 289 (285)). It is a silhouette which lasts throughout the 1590’s but which is suddenly abandoned with the new reign, when sleeves went tight upon the arms. The hair, which is composed almost into a halo surrounding the head with tiny ringlets near the ears, is similarly a feature of the 1590’s (e.g. ibid, p. 278, (no. 265), 295 (nos. 296-297)). The miniature is no doubt intended as a love token because her hand is placed on her heart as in Hilliard’s Young Man Among Roses (no. 263 [P.163-1910]). The veils may be a fashionable form of “undress” because to complete her formal attire she would discard the veils and add a fan-shaped ruff and adorn her hair with a jewelled head-dress.
Until now the dating of the miniature has always been to the Jacobean period, based on the inaccurate identification of the sitter and on a parallel miniature of another lady of the same size, that of Lucy Harington, Countess of Bedford, (no. 274), the costume for which, however, is correct for 1615.
There is no reason why Oliver should not have repeated the effect a decade later. His style and technique did not change and it is no argument as to date. The V&A miniature is one of Oliver’s masterpieces, revealing the infinite variability of his work far beyond the narrow confines of Hilliard who produced nothing comparable in the 1590’s. It is faded which, to an extent, must be taken into account for, originally, the impact of the carnations of the face and rose of the lips must have been even more striking in contrast to the virtuoso chiaroscuro essay that dominates the image, conceived in terms of grey into grey-black with touches of white and highlights of gold and silver. The sitter was clearly a lady of high rank but we have not clues as to her identity.
The concern with chiaroscuro, the figure emerging from the shadows, the elegance and sophistication of the composition and the elusive half-smile of the sitter would indicate that it was painted shortly after Oliver’s Italian visit of 1596 and with a strong recollection of North Italian painting in the form of Leonardo, his followers and Correggio. This one of the first works of English art to respond directly to the art of the Italian Renaissance since Holbein. In this miniature we have surely the Elizabethan response to a tradition that stems from Leonardo da Vinci’s Mona Lisa through the works of his followers in the Milanese School.
The features have faded and the silver has oxidized in some areas.
INSCRIBED: Signed bottom left: IO in monogram; inscribed on the reverse in the hand of Horace Walpole: The Lady Frances Howard Countess of Essex and Somerset, by Isaac Oliver; from the collection of James West, president of the Royal Society, H. W. 1773.
COLLECTIONS: James West (1704?-1772); sold at Langford’s 27th February 1773 (lot 74): “A large and remarkable fine haead of the Countess of Somerset”; bought Morgan, £3.17.6; Horace Walpole at Strawberry Hill (Description of the Villa…at Strawberry Hill, 1774, p. 98); sold Strawberry Hill sale, May 9th 1842 (13th day) (lot 52); bought by the 13th Earl of Derby for 18gns; Earl of Derby at Knowsley Hall; sold Christie’s June 8th 1971 (lot 80); purchased by the V&A with the aid of the N.A.C.F. and the Pilgrim Trust.
LITERATURE: George Scharf, A Catalogue of the Collection of Pictures at Knowsley Hall, 1875, p. 131 (no. 234).
V&A, 1947 (18).
Pope-Hennessy, Lecture, 1949, pl. XXVII.
Auerbach, Hilliard, p. 248.
Strong, Tudor and Jacobean, I, p. 298.
Graham Reynolds, “A Masterpiece by Isaac Oliver”, Victoria & Albert Museum Yearbook, 1974, pp. 7-10.’
Exhibition History
Treasures of the Royal Courts: Tudors, Stuarts and the Russian Tsars (Victoria and Albert Museum)
The Golden Age of the English Court: From Henry VIII to Charles I (Moscow Kremlin Museums 24 Oct 2012-27 Jan 2013)
Nicholas Hilliard and Isaac Oliver (Victoria and Albert Museum 01/01/1947-31/12/1947)
Artists of the Tudor Court: the portrait miniature rediscovered, 1520-1620 (Victoria and Albert Museum 09/07/1983-06/11/19833)
Horace Walpole's Strawberry Hill (Victoria and Albert Museum 06/03/2010-04/07/2010)
Horace Walpole's Strawberry Hill (Yale Centre for British Art, New Haven 15/10/2009-03/01/2010)
Saved! 100 Years of the National Art Collections Fund (Hayward Gallery, London 23/10/2003-18/01/2004)
Labels and date
Treasures of the Royal Courts: Tudors, Stuarts and the Russian Tsars label text:
Unknown woman, formerly thought to be Frances Howard, Countess of Somerset
About 1596–1600
Probably England
By Isaac Oliver
Watercolour on vellum stuck to plain card
Purchased with the assistance of the National Art-Collections Fund (now
the Art Fund) and the Pilgrim Trust
V&A: P.12-1971
Materials
Watercolour; Cardboard; Vellum
Techniques
Painting
Subjects depicted
Woman; Jewellery; Veils; Frances Howard
Categories
Portraits; Paintings
Collection code
PDP
