Studio RT Ltd

Description

We are delighted to offer for sale this delightful portrait, which we believe may be Lady Astor, by the British artist JOHN SHIRLEY-FOX RBA, who has signed the painting in the lower right hand corner and dated it 1928. Nancy, Lady Astor, was elected the first female Member of Parliament by Plymouth in 1919, and served until 1945. She would have been 49 at this time. Please see the many pictures of her on google images and make up your own mind.

JOHN SHIRLEY FOX RBA, 1867-1939, studied in Paris at the Ecole des Beaux Arts under Gerome and exhibited at the Paris Salon from age 16 and at the Royal Academy from 1890. He was elected a full Member of the Royal Society of British Artists in 1892. He was principally a portrait painter, but also painted some Scottish landscapes.

He was living in London in 1890, but later lived in Marlborough, keeping an apartment in London. He was married to Ada R. Holland, a portrait and figure painter, who is also a listed artist and frequent exhibitor. They had no children. His pastimes were numismatics and dry fly fishing in the chalk streams of England and he wrote two books, one about fishing and one about his experiences as an art student in Paris.

His biographical details may be found in The Dictionary of British Artists (Collector's Club) and The Dictionary of British Artists by Grant Waters.

He exhibited 15 paintings at the Royal Academy, 49 at the RBA, 2 at the Royal Society of Portrait Painters, 1 at the Royal Oil Painters Institure, 4 at the Royal Institute of Painters in Watercolour and variously in the provinces.

Bath and North East Somerset Council own a 3/4 portrait of King George V by John Shirley Fox, which is viewable on google, as well as several other examples of his portraiture. Auction listings are available at the usual sites and the record for one of his portraits is over £10,000.

The painting is framed in a superb 3 1/2" heavy gilt swept Victorian frame by Bourlet, as carved on the reverse.

Medium Oils on Reeves & Sons canvas