Portrait of a Woman

Artist John Smart (English, 1741 - 1811)

Dateca. 1786

MediumWatercolor and graphite on wove paper; Modern gilt frame

DimensionsSight: 3 × 1 15/16 inches (7.62 × 4.92 cm)
Sheet: 3 3/8 × 2 1/2 inches (8.57 × 6.35 cm)
Framed: 5 × 4 1/2 inches (12.7 × 11.43 cm)

Credit LineGift of Mr. and Mrs. John W. Starr and the Starr Foundation, Inc.

Object numberF58-60/145

InscribedNone

On View

On view

Gallery Location

Collections

European Art

Terms

DescriptionPortrait miniature of a woman with powdered hair whose clothing is not delineated In the sketch, with the paper support used as the background.Exhibition History

Exhibition History

The Starr Foundation Collection of Miniatures, The Royal Ontario Museum, Toronto, December 8, 1972–January 14, 1973, no cat., no. 116, as Unknown Lady.

John Smart: Virtuoso in Miniature, The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City, MO, December 21, 2024–January 4, 2026, no cat., as Portrait of a Woman.

Provenance

Mr. John W. (1905–2000) and Mrs. Martha Jane (1906–2011) Starr, Kansas City, MO, by 1958;

Their gift to The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City, MO, 1958.

Published References

Ross E. Taggart, ed., Handbook of the Collections in the William Rockhill Nelson Gallery of Art and Mary Atkins Museum of Fine Arts, 4th ed. (Kansas City, MO: William Rockhill Nelson Gallery of Art and Mary Atkins Museum of Fine Arts, 1959), 265, as Portrait of a Lady (sketch).

Ross E. Taggart, The Starr Collection of Miniatures in the William Rockhill Nelson Gallery (Kansas City, MO: Nelson Gallery-Atkins Museum, 1971), no. 116, p. 42, (repro.), as Unknown Lady.

Aimee Marcereau DeGalan, “John Smart, Portrait of a Woman, ca. 1786,” catalogue entry and Rachel Freeman technical note in Aimee Marcereau DeGalan, Blythe Sobol, and Maggie Keenan, The Starr Collection of Portrait Miniatures, 1500–1850: The Collections of the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, vol. 4, ed. Aimee Marcereau DeGalan (Kansas City, MO: Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, 2025), https://doi.org/10.37764/8322.5.1578.

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