wyvern:extra
Georgian beauty research
The unpublished travel diaries of the honourable Mary
Graham (1758-1792) were the focus of a research trip to Edinburgh by Sarah
Symmons in the Department of Art History and Theory.
Sarah’s account of Mary Graham’s journey to southern Europe will appear
next year in Spanish Art in Britain and Ireland 1750 – 1920, edited
by Nigel Glendinning and Hilary Macartney.
Mary Graham became known in Georgian London and at the Court of Marie
Antoinette as a great beauty. She was said to be the most beautiful woman
ever painted by Gainsborough and, after completing her portrait, he
continued to use her face and figure in private fantasy paintings of young
women.
For most of her adult life Mary was ravaged by tuberculosis but her
enthusiasm for travel led her to explore parts of Europe, few British
women had visited before.
After her death in 1792, her husband never remarried. Her portrait
remained hidden from view until after his death, when it was bequeathed to
the National Gallery in Edinburgh, on condition it should never leave
Scotland.
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