4536

Lady Alastair Graham, née Lady Meriel Olivia Bathurst 1920

Seated half-length, head turned and looking to the left, wearing a blue stole round her shoulders over a pink gown, her left hand slightly raised

Oil on canvas, 91.5 x 61 cm (36 x 24 in.)

Inscribed lower right: de László. / 1920. III.   

Laib L9589(930) / C9(13)  

NPG Album 1919-25, p. 13

NPG Album 1917-1921, p. 87

Sitters’ Book II, opp. f. 14: Meriel Graham March 10. 1920.

Private Collection

The Bathursts were very important patrons of de László and he painted ten portraits of the family during his career. Three of these were commissioned between 1919 and 1920, just after his exoneration and release from internment: Countess Bathurst [3544], her son Lord Apsley [2023] and the present picture. According to the Countess they were intended to hang together at Bathurst House, their home in London: “I was waiting till I got to London & saw the picture, before writing to thank you. I have seen the photographs & it is another marvel - I am sure that we shall be quite delighted with it. Thank you a thousand times you must come & see the 3 pictures in Belgrave Sq when they are hung up. I am sure they will look delightful.”^[1] De László signed and gave the sitter the preparatory study [4539] for the present picture, which she hung at her home, Easton Park, near Wickham Market.

Lady Alastair’s appearance at the time of the present portrait was described by her husband in a pamphlet published after her death: “Her eyes were large and blue and her features small and very perfectly shaped. A thick plait of golden hair encircles her head, giving her an individuality all her own. In her beauty there was something virginal and of the Renaissance; a hint of the lovely Bianca Sforza in her profile; more than a hint of Dante’s Beatrice in her demeanour.”^[2] This vision of the sitter seems to have influenced de László second portrait of her, painted in 1925, in a style influenced by early Italian Renaissance portraiture [4535].  

Lady Meriel Olivia Bathurst was born 3 September 1894, the only daughter of Seymour Henry, 7th Earl Bathurst [3541], and his wife, the Honourable Lilias Margaret Frances Borthwick [3544]. Her happy childhood was spent between the family estate at Cirencester House and Bathurst House in London’s Belgravia. In 1902 she attended the coronation of King Edward VII, dressed in lace with a wreath of roses in her hair. In 1911 her parents took Lady Meriel and her brother Lord Apsley to the Continent, visiting Paris, Florence, Rome and Venice.

Her parents hosted two balls to celebrate her coming out and soon after she met Alastair Graham, the younger son of the 5th Duke of Montrose and his wife Violet Seymour. The attraction was instant and mutual but the outbreak of the First World War intervened. They kept in touch through regular letter-writing and in February 1915 Graham was able to secure forty-eight hours leave to travel to Cirencester and propose. He was then posted to the Dardanelles and they were only able to marry on his return in May 1916 at St. Paul’s, Knightsbridge. There were four children of the marriage, Lilias (born 1917), Margaret (born 1919), Ian (born 1923) and Robin (born 1926).

After the First World War, Lord Alastair briefly worked for Beardmore’s Engineering Co., and the family lived in a suburb of Glasgow. Despite a desire to farm in Scotland, they settled on Chantry Farm, near Campsea Ashe in Suffolk. Lady Alastair devoted herself to the education of her children and the lighter work on the farm.

Lady Alastair had deeply held Christian beliefs and shared these with others as a central figure of the Mother’s Union in the Diocese of St Edmundsbury and Ipswich. She travelled throughout East Suffolk to meet and address the many members. In July 1935 she spoke at the Royal Albert Hall at a meeting organised by the English Church Union.

Lady Alastair died just six months later on 18 January 1936, aged only forty-one. Canon Westmacott gave the address at her memorial at Cirencester Church 22 January 1936: “the outside world was allowed to catch a glimpse of the secret of her life and influence, and that was on the occasion when she spoke last July to a large audience at the Albert Hall. She had been asked to speak especially to women, and she spoke of how they might influence the young, and she ended her speech with these words:

If we can get one soul to look into our Lord’s eyes, then we shall not have lived in vain. But we shall not do it by merely talking or organising: these are necessary, but very dry bones. We can never put a spark of life into them unless we give up our lives, bit by bit, day by day, however much it hurts, until the Holy Spirit looks through our eyes, speaks with our voices, works through our personalitits, till we live as if we believed, what is indeed the truth, that the living God is within us, and that nothing matters but his will for us.”^[3]

In May 1936 de László mentioned the present portrait in correspondence with Countess Bathurst about a portrait of her two grandsons [3539], the children of her son Lord Apsley: “Since a Higher Power decreed that the inevitable had to happen so early I am more than happy to know that the portrait of your daughter exists. It gave me so much pleasure at the time to paint it.”^[4]

PROVENANCE:

The Countess of Bathurst;

Lord and Lady Apsley;

By descent

EXHIBITED:

•The French Gallery, London, A Series of Portraits and Studies by Philip A. de László, M.V.O., June 1923, no. 13

•Victoria Art Galleries, Dundee, Exhibition of Recent Portraits and Studies by Philip A. de László, M.V.O., September, 1932, no. 23

LITERATURE:

•Graham, Lord Alastair, Meriel Olivia Graham, privately printed, 1936

•DLA043-0140, letter from Countess Bathurst to de László, 22 April 1920  

•DLA059-0042, letter from de László to Countess Bathurst, 26 May 1936    

KF 2020