Studio RT Ltd

Description

We are offering this lovely portrait oil on canvas by the artist Frances E. Nesbitt, who has signed the painting in the lower left hand corner. This is a bust length portrait of a young girl with long dark hair and a sweet expression, wearing a round necked white dress with full sleeves Although the majority of F. E. Nesbitt's work is in watercolours and is topographical, she exhibited the 'Head of a Little Girl, Gracie' at the Dudley Gallery in 1895. In our opinion, the young girl in this portrait has a look of the young girl paintings of William-Adolphe Bouguereau.

Frances Emily Nesbitt ASWA was born in 1863 in Wolverhampton, the daughter of a surgeon, Francis Albert Nesbitt (1832-1866) and his wife Emily nee Fyson (c.1845-1918). Her father died in 1866 and in the censuses of 1871 and 1881, she and her brother Henry Frank were living with her widowed mother in Ipswich, where Frances attended the Ipswich School of Art.

In 1903, at the Graves Galleries there was an exhibition of 70 watercolour drawings by Francis of Algeria, Egypt, Palestine, Italy, and Spain.

In 1906, she was the author and illustrating artist of the book Algeria & Tunis, published by A & C Black, which was the outcome of two years wandering these countries. She must have travelled a great deal painting, as she does not appear in the census records of 1891, 1901 or 1911. She obviously used her mother's address at 49 Roland Gardens, Kensington, as this is her address as it appears in the probate records on her mother's death in 1918.

She exhibited variously at the Dudley Gallery Art Society in 1900, 'Ilfracombe', in 1902 'Jerusalem', at the Royal Institute of Painters in Watercolour in 1896 'Flower Girls in Regent Street', Ipswich fine Art Club 1901, Suffolk Street 1898 'Whitby' etc. In total she exhibited 61 paintings at the Dudley Gallery, 12 at the Walker in Liverpool, 3 at the Royal Academy, RBA 25, RHA 39, RI 10, ROI 2, Society of Woman Artists171 and the New Gallery 1. She was elected an Associate Member of the Society of Women Artists in 1899.

She died at Hilltop, Bovingdon, Hertfordshire on 12th January 1934, leaving the considerable sum of £38,270.

She is listed in The Dictionary of British Artists (Collectors' Club), The Dictionary of British Artists by Grant M. Waters, and The Dictionary of Victorian Painters by Christopher Wood (spelt as Nisbet, Frances E.)

The painting has been newly framed in an ornate 3 1/4" gilt frame and will be supplied wired and ready to hang.

Image size: 15 5/8" x 12 3/8" - 39.7cm x 31.45cm

Frame size: 22 1/8" x 19" - 56.15cm x 48.25cm

Medium: Oils on canvas

Condition: The painting has been professionally relined in 2005 by a restorer who has listed her name on the back on the stretcher, so is in perfect condition. The frame is new.