Lady Emma Hamilton was one of only four miniatures that my mother painted. This is another painting of a free spirited woman who lead a life outside the norms of society. Despite a humble beginning, she made good use of her looks and intelligence to become a model and actress, not to mention the mistress of a Baronet and then a Member of Parliament. This painting is based on one of sixty paintings done by George Romney while she was his muse around that time. Emma eventually married Sir William Hamilton, British Envoy to Naples, who was 34 years older than her. It was while in Naples that she met and became the mistress of Lord Nelson, hero of the British Navy and cemented her place in history. See the extensive Wikipedia article for details or a well illustrated article on the National Portrait Gallery, UK website.

The miniatures were purchased by my grandfather, ostensibly to sell on after exhibiting them in the lobby of the Royal Hotel in Weymouth where he worked part time in his retirement as their accountant. He ended up keeping them all and left them to his mistress who many years later returned them to the family.

Regarding the technique used to paint the miniatures, my mother showed me the brush she used which was a very simple wooden stick with a single small Woodcock’s pin-feather mounted in the end. When the feather would wear and become dull, she would use tweezers to stick a new one in its place. Apparently, this was the traditional favored brush of Victorian miniaturists. For the substrate of the painting, she used a product called Ivorine, a small sheet of Cellulose Nitrate that had the appropriate color and texture to simulate the ivory sheets used by miniaturists in earlier less enlightened times. Be sure to click on the image to see a greatly magnified view of the original.

The source image: