Portrait of a Girl
Framed: 2 9/16 × 2 1/4 inches (6.51 × 5.72 cm)
Unknown owner, by May 2, 1955 [1];
Purchased from the unknown owner’s sale, Catalogue of Fine Portrait Miniatures, Sotheby’s, London, May 2, 1955, lot 27, as A Miniature of a Girl, by Leggatt Brothers, London, probably on behalf of Mr. John W. (1905–2000) and Mrs. Martha Jane (1906–2011) Starr, Kansas City, MO, 1955–1958 [2];
Their gift to The Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Kansas City, MO, 1958.
NOTES:
[1] “Property of a Gentleman” sold lots 21–32 in the Sotheby’s May 2, 1955, sale.
[2] “A Miniature of a Girl by George Chinnery, signed and dated 1793, nearly full face, her auburn hair with fringe and with pronounced curls falling to the shoulders of her white dress, cloud and sky background, oval, 2 3/8in. Painted a fortnight after a miniature of a lady in the Victoria and Albert Museum, and similarly signed Georgius Chinnery/Pict. Lond./Pinxit/Jan. 16th 1793.” The above mentioned miniature of a lady is Portrait Miniature of an Unknown Woman, 1793, watercolor on ivory, P.5-1914, V&A.
The sale is located at the University of Missouri-Kansas City Miller Nichols Library and is likely annotated by Mr. or Mrs. Starr with a circled lot number. “Leggatt” bought lot 27 for £20. Archival research has shown that Leggatt Brothers served as purchasing agents for the Starrs. See correspondence between Betty Hogg and Martha Jane Starr, May 15 and June 3, 1950, Nelson-Atkins curatorial files.
Martha Jane and John W. Starr, “Collecting Portrait Miniatures,” Antiques 80, no. 5 (November 1961): 438–39, (repro.), as Portrait of a Girl.
Henry and Sidney Berry-Hill, George Chinnery 1774–1852: Artist of the China Coast (Leigh-On-Sea, England: F. Lewis, 1963), plate 8 (repro.), as Portrait of a Lady.
Ross E. Taggart, The Starr Collection of Miniatures in the William Rockhill Nelson Gallery (Kansas City, MO: Nelson Gallery-Atkins Museum, 1971), no. 186, p. 63, (repro.), as Unknown Young Girl.
