Portrait Miniature, Mary Steuart (later Mary Powell), by Diana Hill, watercolour on ivory, ca. 1775-1800.

Portrait miniature on ivory of Mary Steuart in an oval metal frame with a pin on the reverse.

Bequeathed by Mr. Charles Steuart Betton.

P.18-1937, a miniature attributed to Diana Hill of Mary Steuart, later Mrs Timothy Powell was given to the museum in 1937 with a silhouette of John Steuart (b.1776), at the age of nine by Samuel Houghton (P.19-1937) and another silhouette, of Elizabeth Steuart, sister of John, born 1773, also by Houghton (P.20-1937). All three miniatures were bequeathed to the museum by Mr. Charles Steuart Betton.

Historical significance: The dates given on the dpartment file for Mary Steuart are; b.1767, d. 1810. The implication also is that she married in 1795, but there is no entry on the file from the testator for this miniature similar to that on the department files for John and Elizabeth (see. P.19 and 20-1937). It seems likely that she was another daughter of Hew Steuart, and was also born in India (Diana Hill, the miniaturist, worked in India, but the miniature is not signed and this is an attribution only).

Portrait miniatures were frequently exchanged between loved ones and family in eighteenth-century Britain as tokens of affection and remembrance. In colonial India, where many officers were separated from loved ones for long periods of time, there was a high demand for portraits that could be sent to friends and family back home; or that could document and preserve one’s own likeness. Hill painted the portraits of many central figures of the British community in Kolkata.

This miniature was painted by Diana Hill (maiden name Dietz, 1760-1844), a British miniature painter who lived and worked in Kolkata between 1786 and 1806. Hill was part of a group of portrait painters who travelled to India in pursuit of more commissions and artistic acclaim, such as John Smart and Ozias Humphry. As a woman artist, Hill’s position was more contested than that of her contemporaries in India. In a telling display of his prejudice, Humphry proclaimed that he would ‘rather have had all the male painters in England landed in Bengal than a single woman.’ Hill nonetheless persisted and built a successful portrait practice amongst the city’s colonial elite. She likely painted the portraits of local residents, too.

P.18-1937