Lot 129: ORSOLA URBANI

PORTRAIT OF PRINCE HENRY BENEDICT STUART (1725-1807)
with powdered hair, wearing a blue coat and a white stock
inscribed on the cartel: Prince Henry B. Stuart - Duc d'York Né en 1725 peint en 1738 par J.E. Liotard

4.7 by 4.4 cm.; 1 7/8 by 3/4 in.

gouache on ivory

M. Roethlisberger & R. Loche, Liotard, Catalogue Sources et Correspondence, 2008, vol I, p.257).

Anonymous sale, Hotel Drouot, Paris, 20 December 2000, lot. 290

The Jacobite court in exile at Rome employed a variety of artists to supply portraits of its members, both for propaganda purposes and as gifts for supporters of the Stuart cause at home and aboard. Painters such as Rosalba Carriera, Pompeo Batoni, Domenico Corvi and Jean-Etienne Liotard were employed as were lesser known artists such as Orsola Urbani.

The present miniature can be most closely compared with a Portrait of Henry Benedict Stuart by Liotard, now in the collection of the Drummond Castle Trust (see M. Roethlisberger & R. Loche, Liotard, Catalogue Sources et Correspondence, 2008, vol II, cat. no 45).

Recent research into Urbani's work by Dr. Bodo Hofstetter amongst others has shed light on this highly talented but relatively unknown artist.