Elizabeth Southerden (née Thompson), Lady Butler, by Elizabeth Southerden (née Thompson), 1846-1933

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Self-portrait

Elizabeth Southerden (née Thompson), Lady Butler (1846-1933)

1869

oil and pencil on card

8 5/8 in. x 7 1/8 in. (219 mm x 181 mm)

Accession no. NPG 5314

Purchased, 1980

Reproduced here by kind permission

This little self-portrait comes from the period when the artist was studying in Florence. [Commentary continues below.]

Indeed, she looks studious here — keenly focused, intent on accuracy rather than on ostentatious self-presentation. Her austere clothes — the dark bodice, high white collar and the simple jewel she wears round her neck — might remind us that this was the time when the family converted to Roman Catholicism. Or perhaps they relate to her stern Italian master, Guiseppe Bellucci (1827-1882), whose "system forebade praise for the pupil" and who drilled her, she remembered, "more severely than I could have been drilled in England" making her work in monochrome so as to avoid "the distraction of colour" (66). It sounds as if it was a hard discipline, and says much for her character that she accepted it. In fact, Bellucci himself acknowledged that she was "untiring (istancabile), taking study seriously, not like the others (le altre)," perhaps the nearest he could come to a compliment (66). In the portrait, austerity is, however, mitigated by the bloom of youth, reinforced by the warmth of the background. After all, she was only about 23 years old then.

Bibliography

Butler, Elizabeth. An Autobiography. London: Constable, 1922. Internet Archive, from a copy in Robarts Library, University of Toronto. Web. 26 November 2024.

Elizabeth Southerden (née Thompson), Lady Butler. National Portrait Gallery, London. Web. 26 November 2024.

Created 25 November 2024