Sir Thomas Lawrence P.R.A.

(Bristol 1769-1830 London)

Portrait of Mrs Margaret Calverley Bewicke, half-length, in a white dress with a gold sash and a white bonnet

Footnotes

Provenance
With Scott & Fowles, New York
The Collection of Mr. and Mrs Frederick S. Ford by 1960, Grosse Pointe Farms, Michigan, by whom gifted to
The Toledo Museum of Art, by whom sold
Sale, Sotheby's, New York, 25 January 2007, lot 64
With Philip Mould & Co, London, where acquired by the present owner

Exhibited
Columbus, Ohio, The Columbus Gallery of Fine Arts, Sir Thomas Lawrence as Painter and Collector, 7 October - 13 November, 1955, no. 5
Worcester, Massachusetts, Worcester Art Museum, Sir Thomas Lawrence, Regency Painter, 27 April - 6 June 1960, no. 6 (lent by Frederick S. Ford)

Literature
D.E. Williams, The Life and Correspondence of Sir Thomas Lawrence, Kt., London 1831, vol. i, p. 128
R.S Gower, Sir Thomas Lawrence, London, 1900, p. 111
W. Armstrong, Lawrence, London, 1913, p. 114
K. Garlick, Sir Thomas Lawrence, London, 1954, p. 28, reproduced plate 9
Sir Thomas Lawrence as Painter and Collector, Columbus, 1955, exh. cat., no. 5
Sir Thomas Lawrence, Regency Painter, Worcester, 1960, exh. cat., no. 6, p. 26
K. Garlick, 'A catalogue of paintings, drawings and pastels of Sir Thomas Lawrence,' in The Thirty-Ninth Volume of the Walpole Society 1962-1964, Glasgow, 1964, p. 35
K. Garlick, Sir Thomas Lawrence, a complete catalogue of the oil paintings, New York, 1989, p. 152, cat. no. 101, reproduced (as c.1790-95)

Margaret Bewicke was the youngest daughter of the theologian Robert Spearman of Old Acres, County Durham. In 1781 she married Calverly Bewicke of Close House, near Heddon-on-the-Wall in Northumberland. The couple had no children and when Calverley died in 1815, he left his properties to Margaret and thence to his nephew Calverley Bewicke Anderson. Margaret died in 1859 at the age of 97 and was the sole proprietor of Close House for 44 years. During her life, Margaret was an advocate for education, and in 1814 built a school on her estate where local children were educated at her expense.

This portrait is thought to have been executed around 1790-5, just as Sir Thomas Lawrence was beginning to establish his portrait practice in London.