Dame Henrietta Octavia Weston Barnett
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© National Portrait Gallery, London
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Dame Henrietta Octavia Weston Barnett
by Ivan Opffer
Sanguine on paper, 1933
15 3/8 in. x 12 1/2 in. (390 mm x 318 mm) overall
NPG 5437
Inscriptionback to top
Signed and dated lower right: ‘Ivan Opffer / 33’.
On reverse inscr. top right (obscured by backing sheet): ‘Dame Henrietta Barnett’.
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At the time this portrait was made the sitter was over 80 years of age. The drawing appears to have been done from life, presumably in her home at 1 South Square, Hampstead Garden Suburb, London, where she was cared for by her long-term assistant Marion Paterson. By this date she was more or less housebound, her health and spirits failing. The swiftly executed sketch, drawn with Opffer’s characteristic loose but sparing line, acknowledges the effects of age, but also conveys Dame Henrietta’s keen gaze and inquiring expression. It is one of a series of similarly sized portrait drawings of British public figures done in sanguine or black crayon during the 1930s by Opffer, 21 of which are in the National Portrait Gallery Collection (see NPG 5436–5454). The reasons for the artist’s choice of sitter are unknown, but during the 1930s he worked as a freelance illustrator in London (chiefly for the Daily Telegraph) and it is possible this influenced his choices.
Ivan Opffer was a Danish artist who was raised and studied in New York and after war service completed his studies in Paris before marrying Betty Chumley, cousin to Australian painter Arthur Boyd. Around 1930 they settled in Britain, where he drew portraits of Augustus John, G.B. Shaw and W.B. Yeats (NPG 3965); he then worked for a newspaper in Copenhagen until the Second World War, when he returned to New York, before finally retiring to Denmark.
The present work is among those purchased from Opffer’s widow.
Dr Jan Marsh
View all known portraits for Dame Henrietta Octavia Weston Barnett