Mary Darby, Mrs Thomas Robinson 'Perdita' (1758-1800)

Mrs Robinson was most well known for her role of Perdita in the 'Winter’s Tale', performed in 1779. Falling in love as he watched her perform in this role, the Prince wrote her many compromising love letters in which he promised her wealth and a property of her own if she would leave her husband and give up acting, however by 1780 he had taken another mistress. Angry and burdened with debts, Mrs Robinson spent the following 8 months trying to persuade the Prince to honour his promises, taunting him and his new mistress with abusive paragraphs in the newspapers and threatening to publish his letters. The monarchy could not ignore such a scandal at a time when there was a threat that the American colonies would be lost. In the summer of 1781, the Prince negotiated with her and agreed to give her a lump sum of £5,000 and the promise of an annuity if she returned the letters.

Reynolds had seen Rubens's painting of Hélène Fourment on his visit to Flanders in the summer of 1781. In developing a new interest in Rubens's composition, he was also reviving a tradition that British portraits painters, such as Ramsay and Hudson, had developed in the 1740s. At this time, Reynolds worked in Hudson’s studio; he was probably reminded of the convention when he saw Rubens's paintings in 1781. As well as being a learned reference to Old Master painting, the convention also helps to communicate something of Mrs Robinson’s theatricality, beauty and her power to bewitch men. Hélène was only 16 when she married the 53-year-old Rubens. The black hat and neck ribbon frame Mrs Robinson's alluring gaze.

Portraits of Mrs Robinson were a way to raise her public profile, as well as enhancing the fame of the portrait painter. She was painted by many of the leading portrait painters of the day, including Romney and Gainsborough (see acc. no. 2619). The painting drew much attention when it was displayed at the Royal Academy exhibition in 1782. Several newspapers commented that this portrait was the best likeness yet made of the actress. Despite this praise, after Reynolds’s death, his student James Northcote reported that the artist felt he had never been able to capture Mrs Robinson's intense beauty and presence.

Phillippa Plock, 2011

Dimensions (mm) / weight (mg)

770 x 637

Signature & date

not signed or dated

Provenance

• Owned by Sir Joshua Reynolds; P.R.A. (b.1723, d.1792); bought by Francis Charles Seymour-Conway, 3rd Marquess of Hertford (b.1777, d.1842) from Greenwood sale of Reynolds's unclaimed portraits, 16 April 1796, lot 9 as 'A lady in the character of Rubens' wife' (MS notes in some copies of the sale catalogue add 'Mrs Robinson'), for 50 guineas; by descent to his son Richard Seymour-Conway, 4th Marquess of Hertford (b.1800, d.1870); bought from the Marquess of Hertford by Charles Wertheimer (b.1842, d.1911); bought from Wertheimer by Baroness Mathilde de Rothschild (b.1832, d.1924); bequeathed to Eric von Goldschmidt-Rothschild (b.1899, d.1987); sold to Baroness Edmond de Rothschild (b.1853, d.1935); by descent to her son Mr James de Rothschild (b.1878, d.1957); bequeathed to Waddesdon (National Trust) in 1957.

Exhibition history

• Royal Academy Exhibition, London, 1782, no. 22 as 'Portrait of a Lady'
• Royal Academy Exhibition, London, 1872, no. 143, lent by the Marquess of Hertford
• 'Worcestershire exhibition', Worcester, 1882, no. 64, 'Mrs Robinson in hat and feather'
• 'Loan Collection of Pictures', Corporation of London Art Gallery, Guildhall, London, 1890, no. 105
• 'Fair Women', Grafton Galleries, London, 1894, no. 74, lent by the Marquess of Hertford

Collection

• Waddesdon (National Trust)
• Bequest of James de Rothschild, 1957

Bibliography

• H H Hay Cameron; Fair Women; Grafton Galleries, London, Summer 1894; London; Blades, East and Blades; 1894; p. 32
• Algernon Graves, William Vine Cronin; A History of the Works of Sir Joshua Reynolds; 4 vols; London; Henry Graves; 1899-1901; vol. 2 p. 830
• Ellis Waterhouse, Anthony Blunt; Paintings: The James A. de Rothschild Collection at Waddesdon Manor; Fribourg; Office du Livre, The National Trust; 1967; pp. 78-79, cat. no. 28
• John Ingamells; Wallace Collection Monographs I - Mrs Robinson and her Portraits; London; The Trustees of the Wallace Collection (London); 1978; pp. 17, 31-32, ill.
• ♦; Nicholas Penny; Reynolds; Grand Palais, Paris, 9 October - 16 December 1985; Royal Academy of Arts, London, 16 January - 31 March 1986; London; Weidenfeld & Nicolson; 1985; p. 299; on Robinson's sittings coinciding with Tarleton's
• Martin Postle, Reynolds's Portraits at Waddesdon Manor: Painting for Posterity, Apollo, 139, 1994, 19-33; p. 19
• ♦; David H Solkin; Art on the line: the Royal Academy exhibitions at Somerset House 1780-1836; London, Courtauld Institue Gallery, exh. cat., 2001; London; The Paul Mellon Centre for Studies in British Art; 2001; pp. 114-16, fig. 86
• ♦; Hester Davenport, Matching Pictures: Fanny Burney and Mary Robinson, The Burney Letter, 10, Autumn 2004, 6; p. 6, ill.
• Hester Davenport; The Prince's Mistress: A life of Mary Robinson; Great Britain; Sutton Publishing Limited; 2004; dust jacket
• Paula Byrne; Perdita The Life of Mary Robinson; London; HarperCollins Publishers; 2004; pp. 142-143, fig. 7
• Sarah Gristwood; Perdita; London; Transworld Publishers; 2005; p. 297, ill.
• Gill Perry; Spectacular Flirtations: Viewing the Actress in British Art and Theatre 1768-1820; New Haven, London; The Paul Mellon Centre for Studies in British Art, Yale University Press; 2007; p. 66, fig. 42
• ♦; Anca Munteanu, Confessional Texts Versus Visual Representation: The Portrait of Mary Darby Robinson, Journal for Early Modern Cultural Studies, 9, 2009, pp 124-152; p. 125, ill.
• Stephen Duffy, Christoph Martin Vogtherr; Miniatures in The Wallace Collection; London; The Trustees of the Wallace Collection (London); 2010; p. 100
• Gill Perry; The First Actresses: Nell Gwyn to Sarah Siddons; London; National Portrait Gallery Publications; 2011; p. 27, fig. 17
• Ellen Malenas Ledoux; Working Mothers on the Romantic Stage: Sarah Siddons and Mary Robinson; Elaine McGirr, Laura Engel, Stage Mothers, Bucknell University Press, 2014; 79-104; p. 81, fig. 4.2.
• Lucy Davis, Mark Hallett; Sir Joshua Reynolds: Experiments in Paint; The Wallace Collection, London (12 March - 7 June 2015); London; Wallace Collection, Paul Holberton Publishing; 2015; p. 156, fig. 93.

Related files

• • http://wallacelive.wallacecollection.org:8080/eMuseumPlus?service=ExternalInterface&module=collection&objectId=63427&viewType=detailView [copy in Wallace Collection, accessed 29 December 2009]
  • http://wallacelive.wallacecollection.org:8080/eMuseumPlus?service=ExternalInterface&module=collection&objectId=63427&viewType=detailView [copy in Wallace Collection, accessed 29 December 2009]

Subject person

• Mrs Mary Robinson (Perdita), Sitter
• Peter Paul Rubens, Alluded to in image

Person as Subject

• Robinson (Perdita) Mrs Mary (b.1758, d.1800)
• Rubens, Peter Paul (b.1577, d.1640)

Subjects

• Figures/Female
• Portraits/Female
• Objects/Theatrical Items/Performance Costume
• Objects/Furnishings/Soft Furnishings
• Nature, Landscape & The Elements/Countryside
• Nature, Landscape & The Elements/Clouds
• Nature, Landscape & The Elements/Trees & Plants
• Work & Occupations/Arts & Entertainment/Actor or Actress

Genres

• Portraiture/Genres