id: 120844 accession number: 1941.567 share license status: CC0 url: https://clevelandart.org/art/1941.567 updated: Portrait of Sukey, Lady Oglander, née Serle, c. 1770s. John I Smart (British, 1741–1811). Graphite and wash on laid paper; framed: 7.7 x 6.5 cm (3 1/16 x 2 9/16 in.); unframed: 5.4 x 3.8 cm (2 1/8 x 1 1/2 in.). The Cleveland Museum of Art, The Edward B. Greene Collection 1941.567 title: Portrait of Sukey, Lady Oglander, née Serle title in original language: series: series in original language: creation date: c. 1770s creation date earliest: 1765 creation date latest: 1785 current location: creditline: The Edward B. Greene Collection copyright: --- culture: England, 18th century technique: graphite and wash on laid paper department: Drawings collection: DR - British type: Portrait Miniature find spot: catalogue raisonne: --- CREATORS * John I Smart (British, 1741–1811) - artist John Smart is often regarded as the most skilled painter of portrait miniatures at the height of the art form’s popularity in late-eighteenth-century Britain. While the free style and white and blue color palette of his rival Richard Cosway (1742–1821) conjured up the glamour of fashionable society, Smart’s attention to minute detail, saturated colors, and frank conveyance of likeness and character attracted a different type of clientele, one who prized these qualities
above Cosway’s homogenized modishness.
Information is limited about Smart’s life and career, so much so that while G. C. Williamson had penned the definitive biographies of Cosway, George Engleheart (1752–1829), and Andrew Plimer (1763–1837) by 1905, it wasn’t until 1964 that a biography of Smart appeared. Little is known about the artist’s early training beyond evidence suggesting that before the age of fourteen, he was winning prizes from the Society of Arts for his drawings and, like Cosway, was an apprentice in William Shipley’s London school in St. Martin’s Lane. Smart exhibited for several years as an active member and eventually president of the Society of Artists of Great Britain before seeking his fortune as a miniature painter in India, where he lived between 1785 and 1795, hoping to secure patronage from wealthy princes and those
involved in England’s growing trade market. Works from this period are signed with the initial I, signifying India.
Unlike Cosway, an ostentatious showman, Smart lived and worked quietly, settling in London after his return from India and exhibiting at the Royal Academy. His style, which changed little throughout his career, is characterized by a meticulous description of a sitter’s countenance through the use of delicate stippling, often featuring wrinkles, crow’s feet around the eyes, and a slightly upturned mouth that suggests joviality. Unlike his contemporaries Cosway, Engleheart, and Plimer, whose backgrounds most often featured blue and white cloudy skies, Smart painted his backgrounds in varying shades of browns, greens, and grays. The size of the artist’s miniatures expanded over time, measuring around 11/ 2 inches until about 1775, then 2 inches until around 1790, and 3 inches thereafter. Though
highly sought after in his time, Smart’s work grew even more popular among collectors following his death. The Cleveland Museum of Art has a total of twenty-three portraits by Smart: seven gentlemen sitters painted on ivory and sixteen preparatory drawings of men and women. Of the seven miniatures on ivory, two date from 1770, three from
Smart’s years in India, and two after his 1795 return to London. --- measurements: Framed: 7.7 x 6.5 cm (3 1/16 x 2 9/16 in.); Unframed: 5.4 x 3.8 cm (2 1/8 x 1 1/2 in.) state of the work: edition of the work: support materials: description: card watermarks: inscriptions: --- CURRENT EXHIBITIONS title: Intimate Images: Portrait Miniatures from Europe and America opening date: 1993-03-26T04:00:00 Intimate Images: Portrait Miniatures from Europe and America. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (March 26-October 17, 1993). title: Disembodied: Portrait Minatures and their Contemporary Relatives opening date: 2013-11-10T00:00:00 Disembodied: Portrait Minatures and their Contemporary Relatives. The Cleveland Museum of Art (organizer) (November 10, 2013-February 16, 2014). --- LEGACY EXHIBITIONS * Royal Amateur Art Society Exhibition of Miniatures, Moncorvo House, London, (March 5-8, 1904). --- PROVENANCE John Smart (1741-1811), by in heritance to his daughter by Sarah Midgeley, Sarah Smart date: c. 1776-1811 footnotes: citations: Sydney Smirke (1798-1877) by inheritance to his daughter, Mrs. Lange date: 1853-77 footnotes: citations: Mrs. Lange (née Smirke, d. 1928), by inheritance to her brother, Sir Edward Smirke date: 1877-1928 footnotes: citations: Sir Edward Smirke date: 1928 footnotes: citations: Sale: Christie’s, London, December 10. 1929 (lot 9). date: December 10. 1929 footnotes: citations: (Leo Schidlof (1886–1966), Paris, France, sold to Edward B. Greene) date: -1929 footnotes: citations: Edward B. Greene (1878–1957), Cleveland, OH, gifted to the Cleveland Museum of Art date: 1929-1941 footnotes: citations: The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH date: 1941- footnotes: citations: Sarah Smart (1781-1853), gifted to Mary Smirke date: 1811-c. 1853 footnotes: citations: --- fun fact: Sketches helped John Smart work out the particulars of a portrait before commencing the miniature on ivory, and they were useful in the event that a duplicate might later be required. digital description: wall description: Although it is impossible to say if it was always part of the artist’s process to execute a preparatory sketch prior to painting each miniature, we do know that John Smart retained many hundreds of these sketches. A group of preparatory sketches—of which this portrait is one—descended through the Smirke family after Smart’s daughter Sarah gave a sketchbook containing preparatory portrait studies to her friend Mary Smirke, sister of the celebrated Victorian architect Sydney Smirke. This book was probably broken up around 1877 when it was divided between Sydney’s daughters Mary Jemmett and Mrs. Lange, whose portions were both sold at auction in 1928.
G. C. Williamson was the first to suggest that Smart’s sketches were well known and that they were preparatory studies for the painted miniatures. Williamson listed the names of sitters from the sketches known to him at the time, and they include Lady Oglander. This portrait was assigned the historically colorful but fictitious title of “Duchess of Bourbon” at some point after memory of its true identity had been lost. Giving illustrious titles to portraits of unknown sitters was a popular strategy adopted by dealers during the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, often applied to miniature portraits and, in particular, to Smart’s sketches of women. However, when the paper backing was removed from this miniature, the name Lady Oglander was discovered written twice in graphite on the back. The lower inscription seems to have been reinforced or written later and is probably not in the artist’s hand.
Compared to his contemporaries George Engleheart (1752–1829) and Andrew Plimer (1763–1837), whose female sitters were often painted in similar simple white gowns, Smart often lavished more attention on the costumes in his portraits of women, whose dresses incorporated colored silks, printed fabrics, and luxury trimmings like lace and fur, as seen here. The sitter’s head and shoulders face right, and her light hair is dressed high, with flat curls at the back of her head. She has gray eyes and wears a lavender surcoat trimmed with ermine, over a turquoise blue, low-necked dress and white underslip bordered with lace; the ermine trim confirms that the sitter was a titled lady. Smart placed her inside a faintly suggested oval, and the background is unpainted.
Sukey, Lady Oglander (née Serle, d. 1805), married Sir William Oglander, 5th Baronet of Nunwell (1733–1806), in 1765. She was the only daughter of Peter Serle of Testwood, Hants, and delighted the Oglander family by bringing £10,000 to the marriage. Sukey had eleven children with William, eight of whom survived childhood. The Oglanders were a prominent and well-loved family on the Isle of Wight, their presence on the island first dating from the time of
William the Conqueror and lasting until the title expired in 1874 when the last Oglander Baronet of Nunwell died.
This preparatory sketch somewhat resembles a miniature on ivory of the same size that sold at Christie’s, London, in 2000. The sitter’s name is unknown, but she wears a nearly identical green wrap gown and underslip and a lavender surcoat, though it is trimmed with brown fur rather than ermine. Her coiffure is similar to that in the preparatory sketch as well, though in the ivory her hair is ornamented with pearls. The facial features, however, differ, with the sketch representing an older woman having somewhat coarser features. While the portrait may have been idealized in the finished ivory version, it is also possible that the sketch was employed primarily for the costume and depicts another sitter entirely.
Daphne Foskett lists among Smart’s work portraits of a Dr. John Oglander and a Lady and Miss Oglander. A preparatory sketch by Smart of a Mr. Oglander sold at Christie’s, London, on June 10, 2010. Another preparatory sketch titled Portrait of John Oglander, Warden of New College, Oxford, was sold at Bonhams, London, on October 30, 2001. These sketches are approximately the same size as Cleveland’s Lady Oglander and may have been commissions related by date or patron. The sale of Smart drawings inherited by W. H. Bose and sold at Christie’s, London, in 1937 included a “Head of Miss Oglander,” “sister to Sir John Oglander of the Isle of Wight,” but this lot was not illustrated, and its relationship to the sketch discussed here is unknown. John Oglander, Warden of New College, Oxford, was the brother-in-law of Sukey, Lady Oglander, and Miss Oglander was probably her sister-in-law Susannah Oglander (d. 1816). --- RELATED WORKS --- CITATIONS Williamson, George C. The Miniature Collector; A Guide for the Amateur Collector of Portrait Miniatures. New York: Dodd, Mead & Co, 1921. page number: p. 146 url: Christie, Manson & Woods. Ancient & Modern Pictures and Miniature Portraits. 1928. page number: lot 9 url: Cleveland Museum of Art. Portrait Miniatures; The Edward B. Greene Collection. Cleveland: The Cleveland Museum of Art, 1951. page number: Mentioned and reproduced: p. 31, no. 43, pl. XII url: https://archive.org/details/PortraitMiniatures/page/n57 Foskett, Daphne. John Smart: the Man and His Miniatures. [London]: Cory, Adams & Mackay, 1964. page number: p. 71 url: Korkow, Cory, and Jon L. Seydl. British Portrait Miniatures: The Cleveland Museum of Art. 2013. page number: Cat. no. 35, pp. 162-164 url: --- IMAGES web: https://openaccess-cdn.clevelandart.org/1941.567/1941.567_web.jpg print: https://openaccess-cdn.clevelandart.org/1941.567/1941.567_print.jpg full: https://openaccess-cdn.clevelandart.org/1941.567/1941.567_full.tif