19075 Nicholas Hilliard (British, born Exeter 1547, died London 1619) A young lady in a gold and crimson dress with a high-standing ruff England, London Dated 1605 Oval, 51 x 41 mm; pigments and gum arabic on vellum, in a later silver frame with spiral surmount and central hanging loop. Published Daphne Foskett, A Dictionary of British Miniature Painters, New York and Washington, 1972, illustrated in colour, plate VII, fig. 22. Provenance T. Whitcombe Greene Esq.; Sotheby’s, London, 7 July 1932, lot 120; With Leo R. Schidlof, from whom acquired by Ernst Holzscheiter in Paris, 21 May 1938 (inv. nos. MD/0163 and 290); By descent until 2018 Exhibited Geneva 1956, no. 210, illustrated. Edinburgh 1975, no. 28. SAM FOGG www.samfogg.com Inscriptions Inscribed and dated in gold on the blue background ‘An[n]o D[omi]ni 1605 . / Ætatis sua[e] . ’ Condition, Materials and Technique Finely ground mineral and earth pigments were applied in gum arabic solutions on to the vellum support using several grades of brush, both in dilute washes and in thick dots with a high concentration of pigment. Evidence of pooling at the junctions between the blue (lapis lazuli) background and the figure’s outline, as well as areas in which it shows through other paint layers from below (figs. 1-2) indicate that it was applied close to the start of the painting process, and that the form of the sitter must have been left either partly or completely in reserve. The white ground and the creamy surface of the vellum itself are allowed to show through the upper layers in several places, especially in the sitter’s head, where the topography of the face is defined with only very sparse, loose shading. Indeed, the nasal ridge is the only structural facial feature to have been given much definite shading at all, a fine grey wash applied in meticulous parallel hatching giving it the suggestion of a bone structure (fig. 3). The same wash was used in a more restricted manner to shade the sitter’s ears as well as the central depression of her philtrum. The outlines of the eyes and mouth were painted directly onto the carmine flesh tone with extraordinarily fine brushes and a very diluted grey medium, before being reinforced with two stronger concentrations of brown pigment. The same grey and brown washes were built up in layers to create the sitter’s hair, while grey was combined in varying concentrations with an almost opaque white (presumably lead white) in order to evoke the shadow cast by her head and neck onto the back of her ruff. In a second stage, blue and (carbon?) black were overlaid together in short strokes to define the irises and pupils of the eyes, apparently without pausing to let each one dry since there is some evidence under magnification that they were mixed wet-in-wet on the surface of the support (fig. 3). Having executed the eyes themselves, it was evidently felt that the upper eyelids needed further definition, since the same black used in the pupils and irises reinforces the central third of each lid in brisk horizontal brushstrokes. By contrast, the sitter’s costume necessitated an expanded colour palette, with a thick concentration of orange-red (vermillion?) pigment used to evoke its scarlet sleeves as well as the many bows tied along its puffed shoulders and at the centre of the neckline (fig. 2). The same red was used to cover and correct the initial brown centre-line of the mouth, and to intimate the colour of the lips in a series of delicate dots. Other details, such as the ruff’s fine filigree lace trim, seem also to have been executed in multiple stages, the first consisting of a dilute white mixture used to outline its main proportions and laddered design, the second application of more concentrated paint adding texture and highlight (fig. 4). The edge of the vellum is circumscribed with a gilded border, which is lightly trimmed at the upper edge between 11 and 12 o’clock. SAM FOGG www.samfogg.com Context and Attribution The restrained but extraordinarily assured approach to the shading of the facial features of our portrait, as well as the almost total absence of green and black pigments in any of the flesh tones, are autograph characteristics of Nicholas Hilliard’s late style (he describes precisely these techniques in his unpublished Treatise concerning the Arte of Limning, of c. 1600), and are two of the key features that differentiate his work from that of his similarly famous contemporary Isaac Oliver.1 Two other portrait miniatures firmly attributed to Hilliard’s hand and inscribed, like ours, with the date 1605 are known to survive; one in the collection of the Marquess of Salisbury at Hatfield House, and the other in the Musée du Louvre, Paris (figs. 5-6).2 Stylistically, the present example is closely linked to both, incorporating the same use of shell-silver for the highlights of the pearl necklace that can be found in the Hatfield portrait, and an almost identically fashioned and painted coif to that shown in the Paris miniature. The life and career of Nicholas Hilliard – the ‘undisputed doyen of court portraiture’ at the turn of the seventeenth century - have been extensively researched and represented in modern scholarship.3 He lived through the reign of four English monarchs and worked extensively for two of them: Elizabeth I whose patronage, as well as that of many of her courtiers, the painter enjoyed over 30 years; and James I, amongst whose circle he was forced to jockey for favour during the transition to a new monarchic regime. Yet it is clear that like his predecessor, James too was a supporter of Hilliard’s career from the very start, since as far as can be determined Hilliard was the first artist at the English court to whom the King granted a sitting, a mark both of his privileged position, and his potential value for the monarch as an official portraitist.4 The identity of our sitter remains unknown, not only because of a lack of identifying attributes or adornments, but also because, very curiously, the painter omitted to include her age at the end of the inscription. This could be because the portrait was painted well before its intended delivery to a suitor or potential partner, because the patron had it mounted before completion, or, as is less likely, because the age of the sitter was not known at the time of its execution. In any case, it seems to be a unique example of this omission in the whole of Hilliard’s oeuvre. 1 Daphne Foskett, A Dictionary of British Miniature Painters, New York and Washington, 1972, p. 329. 2 We are grateful to Céline Cachaud for bringing both of these miniatures to our attention, written correspondence, 4th February 2019. 3 Most recently in Elizabeth Goldring, Nicholas Hilliard: Life of an Artist, New Haven and London, 2019. 4 Ibid., p. 252. SAM FOGG www.samfogg.com Fig. 1 (top) and 2 (above) Photomicrographs taken at 30 x magnification, showing evidence of pigment pooling and areas in which it shows through the upper paint layers indicate that the lapis lazuli background was applied near the start of the process. SAM FOGG www.samfogg.com Fig. 3 Photomicrograph taken at 30 x magnification, showing the grey wash used to delineate the nasal ridge, dashed brushstrokes defining the eyebrows, and the more concentrated use of blue and black pigments for the eyes. SAM FOGG www.samfogg.com Fig. 4 Photomicrograph taken at 30 x magnification, showing the ruff’s execution in two stages. SAM FOGG www.samfogg.com Fig. 5 Nicholas Hilliard Portrait of a Young Lady Dated 1605 Dimensions unavailable Collection of the Marquess of Salisbury, Hatfield House Photograph courtesy of Céline Cachaud SAM FOGG www.samfogg.com Fig. 6 Nicholas Hilliard Portrait of a young Lady Dated 1605 5.5 cm (height) Paris, musée du Louvre, inv. RF54647 Photograph courtesy of Céline Cachaud SAM FOGG www.samfogg.com .