Miss Anna Jemima Provis was said to have made known to some English artists the receipt for coloring used by the great Venetian masters. It had been brought from Italy by her grandfather.
Mrs. Dards opened a new exhibition with flower-paintings, in the richest colors. They were exact imitations of nature, done with fish-bones.
Mrs. Hoadley, wife of the Bishop of Winchester, was well skilled in painting. Caroline Watson was eminent in engraving. She was born in London, 1760. Receiving instruction from her father, she engraved several subjects in mezzotinto and in the dotted manner. Her productions were said to possess great merit. Miss Hartley, who etched admirably, preceded her.
Maria Catharine Prestel was the wife of a German painter and engraver. She aided him in some of his best plates, particularly landscapes. The marriage was not happy, and the pair separated. Madame Prestel came to England in 1786, where she engraved prints in a style surpassed by no artist for spirit and delicacy. She made etchings, and finished in aquatinta in a fine picturesque manner. She died in London in 1794.
Mrs. Grace exhibited her works seven years in the Society of Artists. They were chiefly portraits in oil, rather heavy in coloring. She attempted a historical subject in 1767: Antigonus, Seleucus, and Stratonice. Her residence was in London.
Mrs. Wright, the daughter of Mr. Guise—one of the gentlemen of his majesty’s Chapel Royal at St. James’s, and master of the choristers at Westminster—was a successful painter in miniature. She married, unfortunately, a French emigrant, who shortly afterward left her, and went to France, where he died. Her second husband was Mr. Wright, a miniature-painter. She died in 1802.
Fiorillo also mentions Betty Langley, Miss Noel, Miss Linwood, Miss Bell, Madame Beaurepas, and the eldest daughter of Smirke the academician.
Walpole mentions Elizabeth Neal as a distinguished paintress, who went to Holland. She painted flowers so admirably, that she was said to rival the famous Zeghers.
Among English flower-painters should not be forgotten Miss Elizabeth Blackwell, Miss Gray, Anna Ladd, Anna Lee, and Mary Lawrence, who busied herself with a splendid work on roses—painting and engraving the illustrations.
Catherine Read painted beautiful family scenes, and obtained considerable reputation as a painter of portraits, both in oil and crayon. A crayon, in the possession of a lady of New York, was recognized as hers by an eminent American painter. She lived near St. James’s, and frequently sent pieces to the exhibition. Several mezzotint prints after her pictures were published. In 1770 she went to the East Indies, staid a few years, and returned to England. Her niece, Miss Beckson, also an artist, who went with her to the East Indies, afterward married a baronet.