SIR THOMAS LAWRENCE
The strangely exaggerated estimation in which Sir Thomas Lawrence (1769–1830) is held by French connoisseurs, is to a certain extent to be accounted for by the superb quality of the picture by which he is best known in France: the portrait group of J. J. Angerstein and his Wife (No. 1813a) at the Louvre, which was acquired in 1896 for £3000. This fine group displays all his bravura and pleasing freshness and brightness of colour, without any of the vulgar tricks and shallow mannerisms of his later years. Next to it should be mentioned the charming half-length life-size Portrait of Mary Palmer (No. 1813c), in a yellow dress, seated in a garden. The completely wrecked Portrait of Lord Whitworth, English Ambassador to France in 1802 (No. 1813), and the Portrait of a Man (No. 1813d), are of no artistic significance.
Neither is it necessary to dwell upon the mediocre Brother and Sister (No. 1801), by Sir William Beechey (1753–1839); the Portrait of Charlotte Sophia of Mecklenburg-Strelitz, Princess of Wales (No. 1818), by Allan Ramsay (1713–1784); and the Portrait of Lamartine, French Poet and Politician (No. 1816a), by Henry Wyndham Phillips (1820–1868). The Woman in White (No. 1816) is at least a sound piece of craftsmanship, even if the attribution to John Opie (1761–1807), “the Cornish Wonder,” is subject to doubt.