The London and Waterloo Tour – Victoria and Albert: Art in Love at the Queen’s Gallery

Victoria and I are looking forward to the Victoria and Albert: Art in Love exhibit at the Queen’s Gallery, Buckingham Palace. The Exhibition features 400 items from The Royal Collection including gifts exchanged by Victoria and Albert such as drawings, paintings, sculpture, furniture, musical scores and jewellery and encompasses their mutual love of music and art. The display also touches upon Prince Albert’s work on ‘The Great Exhibition of the Works of Industry of all Nations in 1851’ as well Queen Victoria in the years after Albert’s death in 1861.

Works by the couple’s favorite artist, Franz Xaver Winterhalter, are on display, as are photographs taken of the Royal couple. A German painter first recommended to Queen Victoria by Louise, Queen of the Belgians, Winterhalter came to England in 1842 and subsequently worked regularly for the queen and her family over the next two decades. Winterhalter was granted the largest number of royal commissions and produced numerous formal portraits, including the one pictured above, which Queen Victoria commissioned in 1843 as a surprise for her husband’s 24th birthday. The artist presents the Queen in an intimate pose, leaning against a red cushion with her hair half unravelled from its fashionable knot.

Winterhalter (at left) was born in the Grand Duchy of Baden in 1805. He excelled at painting and drawing as a teen and went to Munich where he studied at the Academy of Arts. By the late 1830’s he drew attention as a painter of royal subjects. He traveled and painted in almost every court of Europe until the last few years of his life. Though art critics were never very enthusiastic about his work, his portraits were well executed and conveniently flattering.

 

Costumes are also displayed in the exhibit, including Queen Victoria’s costume for the 1851 Stuart Ball  designed by French artist Eugène Lami. The French silk gown is rich in lace and brocade.
You can take a really in-depth video tour of the exhibition here and/or visit the Royal Collection website.

 

Winterhalter’s The First of May 1851, at right,  shows the Duke of Wellington presenting a casket to his one-year-old godson, Prince Arthur, Duke of Connaught, who is supported by Queen Victoria. Behind these figures and forming the apex of a pyramidal composition is Prince Albert, half looking over his shoulder towards the Crystal Palace in the left background. Both the Duke of Wellington and Prince Albert are dressed in the uniform of Field Marshal and wear the Order of the Garter. The painting derives its title from the fact that both the Duke of Wellington and Prince Arthur were born on 1 May, which was also the date of the inauguration of the Great Exhibition in Hyde Park.
 The painting was commissioned by Queen Victoria, but Winterhalter clearly encountered some difficulties in devising an appropriate composition. In the queen’s words, he ‘did not seem to know how to carry it out’ and it was Prince Albert ‘with his wonderful knowledge and taste’ who gave Winterhalter the idea of using a casket, instead of the gold cup the Duke had actually presented to the child. The painting hangs at the Duke’s country home, Stratfield Saye.

Above, Victoria and Albert with their children in 1846, Buckingham Palace

More Magnificence at the Yale Center for British Art, Part Two

Victoria here again, effusing about my visit to New Haven CT to experience in person the delights of Thomas Lawrence: Regency Power and Brilliance.  At left is a self-portrait painted in 1787-88, the earliest work in the exhibition, I believe. It certainly shows great technical ability and promise.  Lawrence was only about eighteen at the time. According to the catalogue essay by Lucy Peltz (Curator of 18th-century Paintings, National Gallery, London), he wrote home at the time from London: “Excepting Sir Joshua, for the painting of a Head, I would risk my reputation with any painter in London.”  Amazing confidence for one so young.  But he had been a prodigy since early youth, encouraged by his innkeeper father to sketch customers to the extent that young Tom was the family’s primary support.  He had occasional stretches of formal education at the Royal Academy, but his career outstripped almost all advice and pedagogy. By 1789, he was painting a portrait of the Queen at Windsor.

Charlotte of Mecklenburg-Strelitz  (1744-1818) married King George III in 1761 when she was seventeen years old. She bore him fifteen children.  When she sat for Lawrence, rather unwillingly it seems, she was about 45 years old and disturbed by the King’s recent bouts of peculiar illness, both mental and physical. The events of 1789 in France did not help. Queen Charlotte had  been painted by many artists, including Allan Ramsay,
Benjamin West, Johann Zoffany, Reynolds, and Gainsborough. Neither the Queen nor the King liked the Lawrence and never paid him. But it was highly praised at the 1790 Royal Academy exhibition and is now in the collection of the National Gallery, London.

Arthur Atherley (1771-1844) was painted in 1792 when he was about age twenty. Exhibited simply titled “Portrait of an Etonian,” the painting was said by one reviewer to be comparable to Sir Joshua (Reynolds), certainly high praise for Lawrence, the relative newcomer to the London art scene.

Mary Hamilton, Later Mary Denham, d. 1837
graphic and red and black chalk, executed in 1789

Mrs. Hamilton read to Lawrence and her husband, artist William Hamilton, while they drew antique statues in the evening.  This drawing was probably a gift to the couple, though Lawrence sent it to the RA for exhibition in 1789.  As Lawrence’s star rose, however, Hamilton’s career did not flourish and the two men grew apart.

William Lock, the Younger (1767-1847), drawn in black chalk on canvas, sometime between 1795 and 1800.

One of the strengths of this exhibition is the excellent selection of drawings by Lawrence, which are far less familiar then his dazzling oil portraits, but equally pleasing to the visitor. 

Lock was part of the “charmed circle” of families that Lawrence became part of, including the Angersteins and Locks. He drew and painted many members of the families and particularly their children.

William Lock’s sister Amelia married John Angerstein in 1799.

This portrait of John Julius Angerstein (1796-1823) was painted in 1790. Angerstein was a wealthy insurance broker in the City of London and one of Lawrence’s earliest supporter, as patron, friend and banker.  He was important to the development of Lloyd’s of London, and was a prominent art collector.  He was born in Russia, and it has been rumored that he was the illegitimate son of Catherine the Great, but it is more likely that he was of much more modest birth. Nevertheless, he acquired a considerable fortune.  Lawrence advised Angerstein on some of his old master purchases. After his death, the collection was purchased by the government to be part of the new National Gallery which now sits above Trafalgar Square.

These Children of John Angerstein, painted in
1807, were the grandchildren of John Julius Angerstein, above. The choice of pose is unusual in that wealthy children of privileged families are rarely portrayed with shovel and broom. The catalogue essay speculates that the elder Angerstein’s philanthropic interest in children would promote, “the hoped-for future for children…the right to play outdoors and enjoy autonomy, and to influence one another through action and word. If a child sweeps as young John Julius Angerstein does, he should do so for enjoyment. In this way the children embody the promise of philanthropy for future generations.”

Countess Therese Czernin (1798-1896), drawn in 1819, was the daughter of an Austrian general. Apparently it remained in the family of the countess and was not known until it was sent to an auction in 1985, where it was revealed as the work of Lawrence. It is now owned by a private collection.  It makes one wonder what other treasures might be lurking in some old castle attic. Another work by Lawrence? A letter from Jane Austen?  A lover’s eye ring?  If you find anything in your castle, please send word.

Several years ago, I stayed at the National Trust Hotel that is part of Ickworth, an estate in Suffolk, built by the Earl Bishop, Frederick Hervey (1730-1803),  4th Earl of Bristol and Bishop of Derry (see our post of 3/9/11).  He built his remarkable house in the last decades of the 18th century. One of his daughters was Lady Elizabeth Hervey (1757-1824), who married John Foster in 1776.  After having two sons with Foster, Bess left him and in 1782 became the close friend and confidante of Georgiana, Duchess of Devonshire. She enjoyed a rather warm relationship with William Cavendish (1748-1811), 5th Duke of Devonshire, as well and bore the duke two children who were raised with the three legitimate Cavendish children. Speculating on the precise nature of this menage a trois tickles our imagination.  After Georgiana died in 1806, Lady Elizabeth became the 5th duke’s second wife in 1809. He did not survive long, dying in 1811, but she lived on as the Duchess of Devonshire until 1824.  If she indeed resembled this portrait drawn by Lawrence when she was age 63 or so, one might understand what kind of charisma the lady had.

Occupying an interesting point between chalk drawings and a finished painting is this unfinished portrait of Emilia, Lady Cahir, later Countess of Glengall (1776-1836) done in 1804-05.  There are three heads here, though it is difficult to see the one on the left.  It is visible in the exhibition if you look closely.  You might be able to make out the lips and the nose of the left-most head just below and to the left of the center head’s chin.

The work was perhaps done at a house party at Bentley Priory where Emilia and Thomas Lawrence both played roles in theatricals. Bentley Priory belonged to the Marquess of Abercorn and was the scene of many country house theatricals.

Charles William (Vane-)Stewart, later 3rd Marquess of Londonderry (1778-1854) was painted in 1812. The catalogue says it is “celebrated as one of the ultimate icons of British military portraiture.”

As Undersecretary for War and one of Wellington’s Adjutant-Generals, Stewart cuts a glamorous and colorful figure.  His uniform is of a cavalry officer, a dashing hussar, with the details and medals highlighted. The portrait also represents a turning point for Lawrence, bringing him an introduction to the Prince Regent and eventual commissions for the Waterloo Chamber portraits (detailed in my next post on the Yale exhibition).

George James Welbore Agar-Ellis, later 1st Lord Dover  (1797-1833), painted  a decade later in 1823-24, shows Lawrence extending his bravura palette of colors into the world of the civilian male.  He was particularly fond of Agar-Ellis who proposed that Parliament purchase the collection of the Late J.J. Angerstein (see above) for the nucleus of a national collection.

To complete this trio of handsome Regency heroes, the portrait at left, again over life size, seems to sum up everything about an aristocrat in his element: Lord Granville Leveson-Gower (1773-1846), later 1st Earl Granville, whose expression, almost a smirk, is absolutely perfect. He was painted in 1804-06 when he was serving as British Ambassador to Russia. Later he was ambassador France.

A younger son of the 1st Marquess of Stafford, he married Lady Harriet Elizabeth Cavendish (1785-1862), known as Harry-O, daughter of the 5th Duke of Devonshire and his wife, Georgiana, in 1809.  They had five children and raised the two by-blows Granville fathered with his mistress, Harry-O’s  aunt, Lady Harriet Bessborough.  He was raised to the peerage as a Viscount in 1815 and to the title of Earl Granville in 1833.

This painting of Lord Granville Leveson-Gower dates from 1804-1809 and is part of the YCBA’s Paul Mellon Collection
  
  Though it might not sound like an auspicious beginning for a marriage, with Granville’s several affairs kn
own to Harry-O, apparently it grew into a strong relationship, as both partners also grew in religious fervor — along with many of the formerly-loose members of Regency society as the years passed into Victorian sobriety and admiration for moral rectitude. At right, a painting of the happy Granville family by Thomas Phillips. Definitely NOT a Lawrence and not in the exhibition.

Rosamund Hester Elizabeth Pennell Croker, later Lady Barrow (1809-1906) was painted by Lawrence in 1826. When exhibited at the RA in 1827, it was highly praised and often surround by admiring patrons.
 
In the catalogue essay, Cassandra Albinson writes, “Lawrence felt one could judge artists’ skill by how they executed white satin, as in the dress depicted here.”  I would say this one is very skillful!

Notice that she lived a very long life, reaching the age of  96 or 97. 
 
  
 
 
 
 
  
Lady Selina Meade, later Countess of Clam-Martinics
 (?1797-1872 ) was painted in Vienna in 1819 and exhibited at the RA the next year. Observers called attention to the highlights of her pearl earrings and gold headband as perfect compliments to her beauty. Note also the excellence of the white satin.  The catalogue contends she had been courted by Lord Granville Leveson-Gower but in 1821 she married an Austrian, Karl Graf von Clam-Martinics.  
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
  
Julia Beatrice Peel  (1821-93) was  painted in 1826-28 when she was about 6 years old. Another adorable child, like we saw in my earlier post on this exhibition. One of Lawrence’s true gifts was his ability to portray the beauty and innocence of children. Julia Peel was the daughter of Sir Robert Peel (1788-1850) who was Home Secretary at the time of the portrait. Later he served as Prime Minister 1834-35 and again 1841-45.  He founded the London police force; they are still called Bobbies, after him. Julia married George Augustus Frederick Child Villiers, who  became the 6th Earl of Jersey, so she was another Lady Jersey.  This portrait, like that of Leveson-Gower, is shown only at Yale.


William Wilberforce (1759-1833) is the man who campaigned for more than twenty years to end the slave trade, which was accomplished in 1807. In 2006, there was an excellent movie about his life, titled Amazing Grace. I recommend it; though it has a few historical inaccuracies, the gist is correct. Making up for any deficiencies in the facts are the excellent performances by a fine cast: Ioan Gruffudd as Wilberforce, Romola Garai as Barbara Spooner, Benedict Cumberbatch as William Pitt the Younger, Albert Finney as John Newton (who wrote the famous hymn), Michael Gambon as Charles James Fox (who actually died before the bill passed), and Rufus Sewell as Thomas Clarkson.
 

Here is a final self portrait by Lawrence, painted in 1825, five years before his death.  Like the Wilberforce and many other of his canvasses, it was unfinished.  Lawrence left a huge number of semi-completed pictures in his Russell Square studio some of which had already been paid for.  He also left numerous debts. 

I would never presume to be able to divide the pictures into the two categories of the Power and the Brillliance, but I almost have done so in this post — the Brilliance. And in my third post, I will concentrate on the Power. Stay tuned.  And just to remind you of how lucky I was to have a fellow writer as a companion, here is a repeat of us in front of the exhibition, Diane Gaston on the right. 

Magnificence at Yale Center for British Art, Part One

Words fail me (Victoria here) when I try to describe how much I enjoyed seeing Thomas Lawrence: Regency Power and Brilliance in New Haven CT.  Kristine wrote about the exhibition on this blog when it was in London at the National Portrait Gallery and Jo Manning did several follow-ups on Lawrence.  But it’s pretty hard to prepare oneself for standing before a larger-than-life canvas in sparkling colors and knowing there are dozens more just outside your peripheral vision. To the right, Diane Gaston and I prepare to enter the Yale Center for British Art on a bright sunny day after a long drive from Washington, DC. Many thanks to our chauffeur cum photographer, Jim Perkins, Diane’s DH.

No pictures were allowed in the exhibition, but we asked if we could take one at the entrance and they  said yes.  Behind the  entrance panel, you get a glimpse of two of the nearly-overwhelming portraits. Left is Lord Mountstuart, from a private collection, and on the right, the famous portrait of Elizabeth Farren, actress, later Countess of Derby.  Diane and I had already been through the exhibition once or we could not have stood still long enough for the shot.  Think we were excited? Oh, just a little!

John, Lord Mountstuart  (1767-94) is a stunning example of raw masculinity that shocked some viewers (like the King!) when it was displayed at the Royal Academy in 1795.  Like many of Lawrence’s portraits — if not all — the dramatic setting is enhanced by the exquisite detail and highlights of white, silver and pink. Lord Mountstuart stands on the edge of a precipice, with Spanish mountains and the Palace of Escorial in the background. Lawrence began this portrait before Mountstuart’s unexpected death at a young age.

Like several of the other portraits, I had visited before with Elizabeth Farren (1759-62-1829) in her usual home at New York’s Metropolitan Museum of Art. I want to put in a reminder here of the excellent novel about Miss Farren, the Earl of Derby (her eventual husband), Anne Damer, and other luminaries in the highest social circles of early 19th c. London, written by acclaimed novelist Emma Donoghue (author of the current best seller, Room). Entitled Life Mask, this is a fascinating fictional account of real people and their intertwined lives, some of it imagined, some of it factual. More details here. 

Lawrence is at his best, carrying on in the tradition of Van Dyke, Gainsborough and others by painting the fabrics so realistically you think you could feel the satin if you touched it.  I covet that muff, by the way.

Most commentators on Lawrence make a big point of the way he flattered his sitters, sometimes outrageously so, as in the portraits of George IV.  But there were a few exceptions to his usual flattery in this exhibition. For example, the Portrait of Catherine Rebecca Grey, Lady Manners, later Lady Huntingtower (1766-1852).  It is a fine portrait, with excellent details.  But I would not say this straight on view of  her face is particularly complimentary. Instead, she looks almost surprised to find us staring at her. The brightly colored peacock beside her draws the viewer’s attention away  from her face.  The fine sheer dress fabric is painted as realistically as Farren’s satin, puddling around her feet like a wispy little cloud. And the rose in her right hand is perfection. 

I don’t mean to infer that she is not attractive, but only that a three-quarter view might have been much more flattering.  That word again. This portrait belongs to the Cleveland Museum of Art, like many of the others on loan to this exhibition.  Yale is the second and last venue for Thomas Lawrence: Regency Power and Brilliance, on view until June 5, 2011.



detail of Catherine Grey, Lady Manners

The other  portrait I find less than flattering is this view of  Robert Banks Jenkinson, later the  2nd Earl of Liverpool (1770-1828).  Again, the head-on view does not compliment him.  He seems to be frowning and his lip is slightly curled, almost as if beginning a sneer.  This painting dates from 1793-96 when Lawrence was doing many statesmen and politicians, and flattering many of them.  Another Lawrence picture (not in this exhibition) of Lord Liverpool done 33 years later, portrays him as less
confrontational yes equally sure of himself.

 At right, Lord Liverpool in 1826 as Prime Minister, in the National Portrait Gallery (not in the Yale exhibition) 

 This drawing of Isabella Wolff (c.1771-1829) is one of many Lawrence did of his close friend Mrs. Wolff.  The exhibition catalogue cautions us not to consider these sketches are preliminary to the oil portrait below, though there are similarities for sure.

Isabella Wolff and Thomas Lawrence remained dear friends for many years, and were sometimes suspected of being lovers. For more on Lawrence’s love life, go backward in this blog to Jo Manning’s essays on January 8, 9, and 10th, 2011. 

 This is probably the first Thomas Lawrence canvas I saw as a child. At the Art Institute of Chicago, it was my favorite picture.   Maybe it still is.

As one of the reviews of the exhibition said, many of us became more than familiar with some Lawrence images because we saw them on biscuit tins and other ads or labels. Or in multiple prints, even paint-by-number sets.This charming view of a thoughtful (or bored) little boy is one of those biscuit tin portraits — you’ve seen it a million times, though you can’t remember quite where.  This is Charles William Lambton, painted in 1825, now in a private collection. Charles was about seven in the portrait and he died just six years later at age thirteen. That gives a distinct poignant twist to this familiar face.

Another very familiar picture, The Calmady Children (Laura Anne and Emily), is included in the show, from the Metropolitan Museum of Art. This pose too, can be found “everywhere.”  And it is not hard to see why. Thomas Lawrence was wonderful with children. Though he had none of his own, never having married, he captured the innocence and joy of childhood in a magical way.    A picture not in this exhibition, usually known as Pinkie, is probably THE most famous, most reproduced, used and mis-used of Lawrence’s work.

Pinkie is a portrait of Sarah Barrett Moulton painted in 1794. It can be seen at the Huntington Library and Museum of Art in San Marino, CA.  It is often shown with a Gainsborough portrait called Blue Boy. (Again, this picture is not in the Yale exhibition.) I actually think I’ve seen Pinkie on a tea towel.

To conclude part one of our visit to the exhibition, here is a lovely family group, another in Lawrence’s bravura style.  The beautiful lady and her son, heir to a great title, with their faithful dog in a scene that will be a family heirloom forever. But wait!!! This is a portrait of Mrs. Frances Hawkins and her Son, John James Hamilton, painted in 1805-6. 
Mrs. Hawkins was a mistress of the imperious 1st Marquess of Abercorn and young John was his son by her.  He had several other children by his three wives. Nevertheless, the picture was displayed at the Royal Academy in 1806.  One London newspaper found it “deficient in sobriety and simplicity.”  Another  commented that the dog was too big and disliked the view through the circular wall.

Diane Gaston and I want to thank Amy McDonald and Kaci Bayless for their assistance and hospitality at the Yale Center for British Art. Everyone was cheerful, helpful and welcoming. We wish we could have attended one of the many programs accompanying the exhibition. They are listed on-line if you click here.  For more information on the exhibition, click here.
Diane has blogged on our visit and you can find her report here.

I will be back with lots more about Thomas Lawrence: Regency Power and Brilliance in days to come. Remember, the closing date is June 5, so make your plans to visit New Haven soon.





Update from Yale…

Victoria here in new Haven CT, on a sunny but chilly day. Diane Gaston and I had a delightful visit to Sir Thomas Lawrence yesterday at Yale’s Center for British Art. I wish every one of our readers could have joined us for this feast of magnificent art: the exhibition Sir Thomas Lawrence: Regency Power and Brilliance. The show runs through June 5, 2011, so you have time to walk, run or crawl to see it.

Kristine and Jo Manning have reported about the exhibit as shown in London’s National Portrait Gallery on this blog. So Diane and I were prepared but nothing really could have readied us for the overwhelming views of so many beautiful, colorful and stunning canvases gathered together. WOW! And the drawings were also wonderful. I will have much more to say and show after we go back today to experience all of it again. And hit the gift shop, too. Yum.

A Look at Lover's Eyes by Guest Blogger Jo Manning – Part Two

Copyright The Art of Mourning

Although the craze for Lover’s Eyes – and it was a craze, thanks to the Prince Regent, later King George IV, who was said to have exchanged lovers’ eyes with his putative wife, Maria Fitzherbert and perhaps with his lover, Mary Robinson (the actress known as Perdita) – flourished for only a short time, his niece Queen Victoria years later was also said to be fond of them and gave them as gifts. To quote Candice Hern, a fellow writer of historical romance novels, “even though the notion of eye brooches was by that time very old-fashioned.”

Ah, but in their day…! Christopher Stocks, writing in the Patek Philippe Magazine last year, noted:
“The combination of royalty and society was as potent then as it is today, and before long the fashion for eye miniatures spread through European high society and as far as Russia and the U.S.”

I first became aware of eye miniatures when I sat in on a presentation given by Candice Hern, as a matter of fact. This was some years ago at a Romance Writers of America conference. Candice’s very fine website shows the eyes in her collection:



Copyright Candice Hern

The examples displayed are prime, and are indeed lovely. Hers are all set into brooches; two show blue-eyed women; two are brown-eyed men. Who they are, again, is not known, and neither are the artists who painted them nor for whom they were intended, though we do have clues that several – and maybe a lot more than several – were painted by the prolific and noted miniaturists Richard Cosway and George Engleheart. (Ozias Humphry is said to have painted a few, also.)

Though a number of miniatures bearing the signature of Cosway are suspected not to be his, Engleheart did make a practice in his later years of initialing or signing his name to his work and these are considered genuine, not fakes. (These jottings are not easy to see unless the eye miniature is removed from its setting.)

Speaking of fakes, they are, alas, proliferating in this age of photo-shopping and cropping and Internet image borrowing. They can, however, be distinguished easily from the real thing upon close inspection owing to the presence of pixels rather than brushstrokes. See this very good article by the late Barry Weber, an expert in the field who often appeared on PBS’s Antiques Road Show.

Weber went on to say that “murky colors that use dark sepia tones” should make one wary, as these colors may be “a heavy-handed effort to falsify age.” He also cautioned, “an antique frame doesn’t add authenticity to the painting.” Camilla Lombardi, director of the portrait miniatures department at Bonham’s in London has been seeing an increasing number of fakes as the real thing becomes rarer, particularly noting caution if a nose, or part of a nose, appears in an eye miniature. She says that in genuine eye miniatures there should be “no real sign of the nose where you would expect it, whereas in a cut-down eye miniature you would see the line of the nose and shadow where the corner of the eye meets the bridge of the nose.”



Copyright PBS

What George Williamson had to say in The Art of the Miniature Painter about the care of miniature portraits would apply as well to the much tinier lover’s eyes:

“Miniatures should not be exposed to a strong light… Violent changes of temperature are to be avoided, and should the ivory become too dry it may crack… Lockets and pendants containing miniatures should not be worn at dances, or on any occasion where the wearer is liable to become overheated, as acid condensation takes place inside the glass which may ruin the painting.”

Ather problem – which perhaps accounts for the rarity of eye miniatures set into rings rather than brooches, pendants, or cases – is that water could get under the glass protecting the miniature and wash away the watercolors. Washing hands was death to a lover’s eye set into a ring.

Copyright parisatelier.blogspot.com

And what are these eye miniatures, these oh-so-romantic lover’s eyes, worth in today’s antique jewelry market? Barry Weber noted, “Few pieces cost less than $1,000.” He added, “American pieces are spectacularly rare,” mentioning “one jewel-encrusted example worth $20,000.” Christopher Stocks values unattributed pieces at $1,500, whilst attributed pieces could go as high as $7,500 each. In the 1950s, when no one wanted them, they could be gotten for next to nothing, out of favor and even considered “repulsive” – to quote the art critic David Piper in 1957 — as both jewelry and art.

The oft-cited reference – in Charles Dickens’ 1848 novel, Dombey and Son – reinforces Piper’s condemnation, with the dismissive description of the lover’s eye worn by the elderly spinster Miss Tox as “representing a fishy old eye…” How anyone could see these eyes in that way is just another example of how one person’s treasure can be considered another person’s trash, or, de gustibus non disputandum est.

Lover’s eyes are exquisite, in the opinion of many contemporary collectors, connoisseurs, and lovers of beautiful objects, and this exhibition will bring them to the forefront once again. It has only taken some 200 years! And, reader, do go through Great-Grandmother’s box of trinkets in the attic once more, for who knows what precious eyes may be lurking there, desperate for the light.

A 20th-century version of an eye miniature, from a Bronzino portrait; note the differences between this and a classic lover’s eye.