4737

Study portrait

Viscountess Grimston, née Lady Violet Constance Maitland Brabazon 1920

Head-and-shoulders in semi-profile to the left, a stole draped around her, her hair in a chignon

Oil on board, 69.9 x 47.6 cm (27 ½ x 18 ¾ in.)

Inscribed lower right: study by / P A de László / 1920 July

Laib L10026 (140) / C11 (7)

NPG 1917-21 Album, f. 110, where labelled in the artist’s hand: the late Countess of Verulam

Sitters’ Book II, opp. f. 16: Violet Grimston Aug. 7 1920

Studio Inventory, p. 47 (240): Profile Portrait of the Countess of Verulam. Acquired by the Earl of Verulam after the artist’s death. Lady Verulam died suddenly in 1936.

Gorhambury Estates Company

This portrait study of Lady Violet Grimston is dated nine months after the full-length, life-sized double portrait of the sitter and her son dressed as Venus and Cupid [4734]. The sitter recorded in her diary that de László had promised to paint another portrait of her, concerned as he was that she might not be satisfied with the mythological painting. The resulting portrait, executed in August 1920, depicted the sitter seated full-length [4735]; the present study was painted a month before and may have been an early study for the formal double portrait.

Alternatively, the study may represent de László’s habit of producing portrait sketches of sitters as a souvenir of the friendship forged during the portrait commission, some of which he kept. After the artist’s death, as in this instance, many such studies were offered to the sitters or their descendants by de László’s executors.

PROVENANCE:

In the possession of the artist on his death;

Purchased by the fourth Earl of Verulam from the executors of de László’s estate in 1938;

By descent in the family

CC 2008