print
- Museum number
- 2019,7070.1
- Description
-
Portrait of Harriet Smithson, seated full-length before a mantelpiece, wearing a feathered hat and a flounced gown with a ruff. Proof before letters
Lithograph, with borderline drawn in pen and black ink
- Production date
- 1827-1833
- Dimensions
-
Height: 418 millimetres (Sheet)
-
Width: 295 millimetres (Sheet)
- $Inscriptions
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- Curator's comments
- The Irish actress Harriet Smithson was especially admired for her Shakespearean roles and had particular success with a run of tragedies performed in Paris in 1827. Given the apparent age of the sitter, this print probably dates either from the 1827 tour or from just after Smithson's return to Paris, from an unappreciative London, in 1830. The lettered state of this print, of which an impression is in the Bibliothèque Nationale, gives Smithson's date of birth as 1802, two years later than her actual birthdate. The title also gives her maiden name, which means the print must predate her marriage to the composer Hector Berlioz in October 1833.
- Location
- Not on display
- Acquisition notes
- Purchased by Christopher Mendez in Paris in the 1960s (he noted when presenting the gift to the department that 'I bought this print... because I was enamoured with the music of her husband Hector Berlioz'). When he bought the print, it was attributed to Deveria.
- Department
- Prints and Drawings
- Registration number
- 2019,7070.1