6398

Mrs Robert Finnie McEwen, née Mary Frances Dundas 1914

Seated three-quarter length to the left in a carved wood armchair, wearing a midnight blue velvet evening dress with a black stole around her arms, a brooch with a crucifix at her breast, a long rope of pearls around her neck and pearl drop earrings; her right hand, wearing a grey glove, resting on her lap, her left holding the arm of the chair

Oil on canvas, 174 x 107.4 cm (68 ½ x 42 ¼ in.)

Indistinctly inscribed lower right: P.A. de László / 1914. III.

Sitters’ Book I, f. 92: Mary Frances McEwen / March 15 1913

Private Collection

The McEwens were notable patron of de László, who produced eight portraits of the family (1911-1925). In 1911, Robert Finnie McEwen commissioned de László to paint his sister-in-law, Louise Dundas [4967]. The pose of Mary McEwen in three-quarter length format, the dark rich palette, and the brocade fabric in the background, all echo Louise’s portrait. According to a descendant of the sitter, Mary’s portrait was intended to hang with Louise’s and those of her other two sisters-in-law, Anne and Henrietta, at Marchmont, her husbands’ estate in Berwickshire.^[1]

One of de László’s appointment books for 1913^[2] suggests that Mary McEwen signed his sitters’ book the day of her first sitting, on 15 March 1913. Further appointments were recorded in the afternoons of 17th, 21st, and in the morning of 24th, but a series of four consecutive sittings in early May was crossed out, to enable him to paint the full-length portrait of Lord Devonport [4571].

It seems the artist worked on her portrait again on 27 and 30 May,^[3] and on 2 June, Lucy de László recorded in her own diary: “P. went to studio […] to paint Mrs McEwen”.^[4] The portrait, however, was not completed at the time. In a letter to Mrs McEwen dated 21 June 1913, de László wrote: “ I am very disappointed that I was not able to finish your portrait in time for my exhibition^[5] […] I had such a lucky start with it & wish to give it a worthy finish. I hope to be able to send you the picture by the end of this month. I put a temporary varnish on the face & it looks very well.”^[6]

Mary McEwen’s picture was not signed until March 1914, at a time when de László, who was travelling on the continent, only spent one week in London, between 14 and 23 March. Having missed the opportunity to exhibit her portrait at Agnew’s, the artist showed it at the Scottish Academy of Arts in 1914.

The following year, de László painted the sitter’s two sons, John [6411] and James [6407] in uniform, and in 1916, her daughter Katharine [10052], who married the 11th Earl of Scarbrough. He also painted her husband in 1925 [6396] and her daughter-in-law, Mrs. John McEwen, in 1930 [6411]. He had already painted her mother, The Hon. Mrs. Dundas, in 1912 [4966].

Mary Frances Dundas, born in India in 1864, was the eldest daughter of Robert Henry Duncan Dundas (1823-1912) and his wife Catherine Anne Carrington Napier (1841-1929), the eldest daughter of Field Marshal Robert, 1st Lord Napier of Magdala. As a student at Edinburgh College of Art, she painted copies of pictures in the Scottish National Gallery, most notably a full-size copy of Raeburn’s full-length portrait of her great-great grandfather, Admiral Adam Duncan, 1st Viscount Duncan of Camperdown. She became engaged to John Guille Millais (1865-1931), fourth son of Sir John Everett Millais and himself a renowned wildlife artist and sportsman. For some now-forgotten reason the engagement was broken, so close to the wedding that the presents had to be returned. On 20 July 1893 she married Robert Finnie McEwen of Marchmont and Bardrochat, son of the Reverend John McEwen. They had two sons, John Helias Finnie (born 1894), later Sir John, who became a Member of Parliament and James Robert Dundas (born 1896), who was killed in action in France in 1916. They also had two daughters, Katharine Isobel (born 1900) and Elizabeth Jeannet Mary, who was killed in a riding accident aged eleven. Throughout her life, Mary McEwen was known for her strong personality. In widowhood she went on several cruises with her maid, Miss Rome. One day, irritated by some incompetence, she snapped: “Rome, you are a fool!” To which Miss Rome snapped back: “If I wasn’t I wouldn’t have worked for you all these years!”  Her character was also marked with a good sense of humour as presumably it was she herself who circulated this story. Mary Frances McEwen died on 9 December 1944.

The sitter was also painted, with her two daughters, by Sir John Lavery in 1907;

PROVENANCE:

By descent in the family;

Sold at auction at Sotheby’s, Modern British and Irish Paintings, Drawings and Sculpture, 12 October 1988, lot 25;

Offered at Christie’s, 20th Century British Art, 11 May 2005, lot 46

EXHIBITED:        

Royal Scottish Academy, Edinburgh, Annual Exhibition, 1914, no. 291

LITERATURE:

•Field, Katherine ed., Transcribed by Susan de Laszlo, The Diaries of Lucy de László Volume I: (1890-1913), de Laszlo Archive Trust, 2019, p. 217, ill.

•László, Philip de, Charles Letts’s 1913 pocket diary, private collection

•László, Lucy de, 1913 diary, private collection

We are grateful to John McEwen for his assistance with this biography.

CC 2008