Portrait of Catherine Grey, Lady Manners (1794): Art, History and Details

Portrait of Catherine Grey, Lady Manners (1794) is in the Cleveland Museum of Art collection. The museum's creator attribution is Thomas Lawrence (British, 1769–1830).

The work and its context

The museum's open-access catalogue describes the work:

The Irish poet Lady Manners rejected as “unflattering” this portrait representing her as the goddess Juno, symbolized here by the peacock. Thomas Lawrence exhibited the painting at the Royal Academy in 1794 with the label “to be disposed of [sold],” but it was still in the artist’s collection when he died. Though it offended Lady Manners, the painting displays all the hallmarks of Lawrence’s flamboyant style:dazzling, fluid brushwork and an innovative use of unconventional colors that helped secure his role as the most fashionable portrait painter in turn-of-the-century Britain.

Object facts

• Title: Portrait of Catherine Grey, Lady Manners
• Date: 1794
• Creator attribution: Thomas Lawrence (British, 1769–1830)
• Culture: England, 18th century
• Type: Painting
• Technique: oil on canvas
• Dimensions: Framed: 280.5 x 185 x 9 cm (110 7/16 x 72 13/16 x 3 9/16 in.); Unframed: 255.3 x 158 cm (100 1/2 x 62 3/16 in.)
• Collection: P - British before 1800
• Department: European Painting and Sculpture
• Accession number: 1961.220

A detail from the museum

Catherine was an Irish poet who wrote of longing to escape the fashionable world.

Collection credit

Bequest of John D. Rockefeller Jr.

Further reading listed by the museum

• Williams, John. Memoirs of the Royal Academicians; Being an Attempt to Improve the National Taste. [London]: H.D. Symonds, P. M'Queen, and T. Bellamy, 1796.
• Redford, George. Art Sales. A History of Sales of Pictures and Other Works of Art. With Notices of the Collections Sold, Names of Owners, Titles of Pictures, Prices and Purchasers, Arranged Under the Artists of the Different Schools in Order of Date. Including the Purchases and Prices of Pictures for the National Gallery. London, United Kindgom: Bradbury, Agnew, & Co., Printers, the "Whitefriars" Press, 1888.
• Gower, Ronald Sutherland, and Algernon Graves. Sir Thomas Lawrence, With a Catalogue of the Artist's Exhibited and Engraved Works. London, United Kingdom: Goupil, J. Boussod, Manzi, Joyant, successors, 1900.

View the collection record

See the museum's photographs and full catalogue entry. Catalogue text is reproduced from the Cleveland Museum of Art's open-access data, with HTML formatting removed. This object and its supplied image are designated CC0.