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Mary Anne Keeley (née Goward)

1 of 4 portraits of Mary Anne Keeley (née Goward)

Mary Anne Keeley (née Goward), by Julia Bracewell Folkard, 1898 -NPG 1558 - © National Portrait Gallery, London

© National Portrait Gallery, London

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Mary Anne Keeley (née Goward)

by Julia Bracewell Folkard
Oil on canvas, 1898
19 1/4 in. x 15 1/4 in. (489 mm x 387 mm)
NPG 1558

Inscriptionback to top

Signed lower left outside oval: ‘Julia B Folkard / 1898’;
inscr. top right outside oval: ‘Mary Anne Keeley / Aged 92’.
On reverse canvas stamp: ‘Winsor & Newton’s / Best Artists Canvas / Rathbone Place / 386/16’.
On edges of canvas, stamp: ‘20-16’ (twice).
Label formerly on back of frame: ‘M[rs] Mary Anne Keeley / Comedian. At the age of 9[2] / Born 28(?) …br 1805 …99 / by Julia …’.
signed lower left outside oval 'Julia B Folkard / 1898'
canvas stamp: 'Winsor & Newton's /Best Artists Canvas / Rathbone Place / 386/16'
Canvas edges stamped 20-16 (twice)
Label formerly on back of frame: 'M... Mary Anne Keeley / Comedian. At the age of 9---/
Born 28(?) ....br 1805 ..... 99
by Julia .... ....... '

This portraitback to top

This is the second of two portraits of Keeley painted by Folkard, the first being a larger half-length (620 x 510mm; see ‘All known portraits, In private character, Paintings, drawings, sculptures and prints, 1892’). Here her head and shoulders, and the arm clasping a handsome black cat, are held within an oval, invoking the popular portrait format of the sitter’s youth. Both likenesses present the actress in benign, half-smiling mood with a direct, alert expression, and in both she is dressed in black, with a high collar fastened by the same large circular brooch, also seen in Walter Goodman’s two portraits (see ‘All known portraits, In private character, Paintings, drawings, sculptures and prints, 1884’ and ‘1887’). In both of Folkard’s portrayals, the softly curled hair framing Keeley’s face is very different from the severe centre parting of Goodman’s portrait of 1884; the latter’s 1887 depiction suggests that in her last decade Keeley changed her hairstyle to this gentler mode. By this date, she was feted as a veteran of the early Victorian theatre, her performances in popular comedies of the 1840s and 1850s being fondly recalled. When Goodman’s second portrait of Keeley was shown at the Royal Academy in 1888, one critic described it as ‘full of interest for all lovers of the theatre, for its subject is a dramatic artist who has long since endeared herself to the hearts of all the elder generation of playgoers’, noting the sitter’s bright eyes and lively, youthful smile and adding that Goodman had ‘successfully caught the expression, at once genial and intellectual, of the famous heroine of many an “Adelphi screamer” in the old days when the world went to the Adelphi [Theatre] for laughter”’. [1] Hence, in part, Keeley’s renewed renown, leading to a clutch of late portraits, including those by Folkard.

Of Folkard’s earlier portrait of Keeley, one critic wrote: ‘Mrs Keeley at the age of eighty-six, looking so well and sprightly that the Artist must have been at considerable pains to induce her to sit still just one moment for the portrait. Long may she remain with us! Our compliments to the Artist.’ [2]

Cats appear to have been Keeley’s favourite animal. Goodman noted the ‘fine Persian cat who was as devoted to his mistress as she to him’, which strolled into the room while she was sitting to Goodman in 1887. [3] Is this or a successor the animal portrayed in the present work?

Julia Bracewell Folkard was a regular exhibitor at the RA from 1873 to 1917, with a mixture of subject pictures and portraits. One of her last exhibits was a portrait of the late Mrs John Billington, a comic actress from the generation that succeeded Keeley (RA 1917(524)), but there is no other indication of any theatrical predilection on Folkard’s part.

The paint was applied wet-in-wet in a direct, vigorous manner, with semi-impasted brushstrokes on the head and thinner application elsewhere. Some subsequent surface blooming was reduced during conservation, but milky blanching in the dark areas of dress and cat appeared to belong to the paint layer. [4]

Gallery records include an inscription for the portrait’s tablet or caption which gives its accession number as 1558 and reads: ‘Mary Ann Keeley / 1805(?) – 1899 / Comedian / Painted in 1898 by Julia B. Folkard / Presented by the artist, Nov.1909’. [5] But it appears that the work was formally acquired six years later, when Folkard wrote to the director, saying:

[two paras in this quotation]
I am desirous of presenting to the National Portrait Gallery a portrait by myself of the celebrated early Victorian actress Mrs Keeley, painted when she was 92 years of age, shortly before her death which occurred early in 1899 … It is a small canvas (20 x 16) just a life-size head.

I painted, & sold, another portrait of Mrs Keeley when she was 86, which was exhibited on ‘the line’ at the R.A. Exhibition of 1893, but the one I am now offering you was considered by the old actress the best ever painted of her. [6]


Folkard was then requested to bring the picture in, and on 22 November 1915 she was informed that the Trustees had accepted the work; it was duly accessioned at the end of the month. [7]

Dr Jan Marsh

Footnotesback to top

1) Anon in the Era (no further details), quoted in Goodman 1895, p.270. Goodman also published three articles on Keeley in Sala’s Journal: ‘People I Have Painted’ (18 Mar. 1893, pp.247–8), ‘After Many Years’ (25 Mar. 1893, pp.272–3) and ‘The “Academy” Mrs Keeley’ (1 Apr. 1893, pp.307–8). The last item related to his 1887 portrait – see ‘All known portraits, In private character, Paintings, sculptures, drawings and prints, 1887’.
2) Punch, 13 May 1893, p.15.
3) Goodman 1895, p.262.
4) NPG conservation report, 28 Nov. 1985.
5) Memo dated 5 Feb. 1910, NPG RP 1558.
6) Letter from J.B. Folkard to C.J. Holmes, 8 Oct. 1915, NPG RP 1558.
7) Memo dated 25 Nov. 1915, NPG RP 1558. A note on the record of Folkard’s appointment to see Holmes notes that ‘Sir Beerbohm Tree has the other portrait of Mrs Keeley’.

Physical descriptionback to top

Half-length to front, holding black cat.

Conservationback to top

Conserved, 1985.

Provenanceback to top

Given by the artist,1909.

View all known portraits for Mary Anne Keeley (née Goward)