Victoria, Duchess of Kent (1786-1861) Signed and dated 1861
Oil on canvas | 91.5 x 71.1 cm (support, canvas/panel/stretcher external) | RCIN 405385
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Winterhalter was born in the Black Forest where he was encouraged to draw at school. In 1818 he went to Freiburg to study under Karl Ludwig Schüler and then moved to Munich in 1823, where he attended the Academy and studied under Josef Stieler, a fashionable portrait painter. Winterhalter was first brought to the attention of Queen Victoria by the Queen of the Belgians and subsequently painted numerous portraits at the English court from 1842 till his death.
The Duchess, Queen Victoria's mother, had died on 16 March 1861. The portrait was begun in June. On 14 June the Queen sat with Winterhalter 'directing the painting of dearest Mama's picture, which is a difficulty, but which he is sure to solve'. Later she wrote that 'it stands in my room & I love to look at it, though it makes me so sad'. The painter may have worked from photographs or from his earlier portrait of the Duchess in 1857 (RCIN 406883).
Signed and dated: Fr Winterhalter / 1861. Inscribed on the back with the names of the artist and sitter and as painted from recollection, June 1861.Provenance
Commissioned by Queen Victoria; recorded hanging in the Queen's Sitting Room (Room no 214) at Windsor Castle in 1878
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Creator(s)
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Medium and techniques
Oil on canvas
Measurements
91.5 x 71.1 cm (support, canvas/panel/stretcher external)
115.50 x 95.0 x 10.8 cm (frame, external)
Category
Object type(s)