Thomas Forster, Portrait of a Woman, 1703

Chicago:

Aimee Marcereau DeGalan, “Thomas Forster, Portrait of a Woman, 1703,” catalogue entry 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. 2, ed. Aimee Marcereau DeGalan (Kansas City, MO: Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, 2024), https://doi.org/10.37764/8322.5.1219.

MLA:

Marcereau DeGalan, Aimee. “Thomas Forster, Portrait of a Woman, 1703,” catalogue entry. 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, edited by Aimee Marcereau DeGalan, vol. 2, Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, 2024. doi: 10.37764/8322.5.1219.

See the artist’s biography in volume 4.

Many histories of limning in Britain characterize the end of the seventeenth century as a period of decline.¹ With the exception of Peter Cross (ca. 1645–1724), who continued to work until 1724, the majority of practitioners, including Samuel Cooper (ca. 1608–1672), Nicholas Dixon (active 1660–1708), Thomas Flatman (1635–1688), and Richard Gibson (ca. 1615–1690), had all died. At this same moment, miniaturists began to shift from painting on vellum to ivory.² Katherine Coombs suggests that the introduction of ivory underscores the diminishing prospects of traditional limning in the late seventeenth century.³ She attributes this decline, in part, to market competition for small portraits and the evolving tastes of patrons.

This competitive market precipitated the emergence of a novel category of small portraits executed in plumbago, “a medium influenced by and deriving authority from engravings”⁴ and the book trades of the Netherlands. Originally conceived as preparatory drawings for prints, plumbagos maintained utility in that role but also evolved into sought-after standalone works. Executed on vellum, they offered the stature of limnings at a lower cost.⁵

Although Thomas Forster was not an engraver, he distinguished himself as a preeminent practitioner of plumbago. Employing a nuanced interplay of line thickness and direction, Forster adeptly conveyed fabric textures, skin tones, hair intricacies, and jewelry details in his sensitively rendered portraits, including the three shown here (Fig. 1, F58-60/53.1,2; and Fig. 2, F58-60/55.1,2). Forster used lines to articulate the crisp folds of satin of the women’s dresses and curved strokes that describe the rumpled cotton chemises they wear underneath (Fig. 1). He also communicated the character of his sitters’ faces, seen for example in the portrait of the aged man (Fig. 2) through his deployment of soft creases around the sitter’s nose and eyes that lend the appearance of an individual wizened through years of study and life. Forster’s detailed, monochromatic works, often commissioned by academics and writers, served as a foundational sources for engravings and appealed to fashionable women who appreciated the meticulous and sensitive nature of his work.

Despite the anonymity of Forster’s sitters, the visual resemblance between the woman in the present portrait and in figure 1 once prompted speculation that they were sisters.⁶ However, the standardized ideals of beauty in the seventeenth century, coupled with the absence of any inscriptions, leave their identities—as well as that of the man—cloaked in uncertainty. The quest for further provenance details may eventually unveil their names⁷, but for now, these remarkably nuanced likenesses endure as testaments to Forster’s skill and the intriguing intersections of art, academia, and societal aesthetics during this era.

Notes

1. Katherine Coombs makes this point in The Portrait Miniature in England (1998; repr., London: Victoria and Albert Publications, 2005), 76.

2. The use of ivory as a support instead of vellum was introduced by Rosalba Carriera (Italian, 1675–1757) in 1705. Bernard Lens (1682–1740) painted the first miniature on ivory in England in 1708. See Patrick J. Noon, “Miniatures on the Market,” in John Murdoch, Jim Murrell, Patrick J. Noon, and Roy Strong, The English Miniature (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1981), 171.

3. See Coombs, Portrait Miniature in England, 76–77.

4. Noon, “Miniatures on the Market,” 166.

5. Coombs, Portrait Miniature in England, 76.

6. The Philbrook Museum in Tulsa, Oklahoma, houses other works by Forster donated by the Starrs: Portrait of a Woman, 1705, 1958.17.1 and Portrait of a Man, 1703, 1958.17.2. The resemblance of the female sitters prompted a Philbrook colleague to suggest they could be related. See notes in curatorial files.

7. See the provenance for Portrait of a Woman (Fig. 1) at the object’s page in this catalogue and for Portrait of a Man (Fig. 2) at its page.

Unknown owner, by 1950 [1];

Purchased from the unknown owner’s sale, Fine Objects of Vertu, Miniatures, Ivories, Gold Boxes, Etc., Sotheby’s, London, December 14, 1950, lot 97, as Six Plumbago Miniatures, by Leggatt Brothers, London, probably on behalf of Mr. John W. (1905–2000) and Mrs. Martha Jane (1906–2011) Starr, Kansas City, MO, December 14, 1950–1958 [2];

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

Notes

[1] In the Sotheby’s December 14, 1950, sale, “Other Properties” sold lots 53–100.

[2] Described in the sales catalogue as, “Six Plumbago Miniatures by Thomas Forster, all signed and dated between the years 1703 and 1715, the three men wearing wigs and the three ladies, probably sisters, all similarly posed, in burr-wood frames, oval, 4 1/2 in.” The annotated catalogue for this sale is located at University of Missouri-Kansas City’s Miller Nichols Library. The annotations are most likely by Mr. or Mrs. Starr. Lot 97 is annotated in pencil with “£65” written to the left of the lot number. According to an attached price list, Leggatt bought lot 97 for “£65.” 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.

The group of six plumbagos that sold includes the three other Forsters in the Nelson-Atkins collection: Portrait of a Woman, 1704, F58-60/53.1,2; Portrait of a Cleric, 1704, F58-60/56.1,2; and Portrait of a Man, 1705, F58-60/55.1,2, as well as two now located at the Philbrook Museum of Art, Tulsa, OK: Portrait of a Woman, 1705, 1958.17.1 and Portrait of a Man, 1703, 1958.17.2. All are numbered 1–6 in pencil on the case back. Many thanks to Tiffany Roberts, Assistant Registrar at the Philbrook, who allowed us access to the Starr Miniatures’ object files.

The Starr Foundation Collection of Miniatures, The Royal Ontario Museum, Toronto, December 8, 1972–January 14, 1973, no cat., no. 32, as Unknown Lady.

Catalogue of Fine Objects of Vertu, Miniatures, Ivories, Gold Boxes, Etc. (London: Sotheby’s, December 14, 1950), lot 97, as Six Plumbago Miniatures.

Ross E. Taggart, The Starr Collection of Miniatures in the William Rockhill Nelson Gallery (Kansas City, MO: Nelson Gallery-Atkins Museum, 1971), no. 32, p. 16, (repro.), as Unknown Lady.