Caroline Blanche Elizabeth (née FitzRoy), Lady Lindsay

Inscriptionback to top

Signed in monogram and dated in red lower left: ‘JMJ 74’.

This portraitback to top

The sitter and artist Joseph Middleton Jopling were acquainted through her husband, Sir Coutts Lindsay, who like Jopling was active in both the Volunteer movement and the campaign to restore Warwick Castle.

Shown at the Royal Academy in 1874 as Lady Lindsay of Balcarres, this portrait was probably executed in London, possibly soon after the artist’s marriage in January 1874 to Louise Romer, later Jopling-Rowe, who became a good friend of the sitter. In late summer of the same year, the Joplings joined a houseparty at Balcarres, Fife, the Lindsays’ Scottish home, during which visit Louise Jopling worked on a picture of Blanche, entitled Looking Back .[1]

The sitter was an accomplished artist and musician, who at the same houseparty accompanied soprano Christine Nilsson in a recital of Schubert lieder; [2] she is depicted with her violin in portraits by her husband and George Frederic Watts (see ‘All known portraits, mid-1860s’ and ‘1877’). According to Louise Jopling, Blanche ‘painted remarkably well, played the violin and had a charming talent for writing short stories, drawing room plays and verses’. [3]

Dr Jan Marsh

Footnotesback to top

1) Jopling 1925, pp.73–7.
2) Surtees 1993, p.192.
3) Jopling 1925, p.74.

Physical descriptionback to top

Three-quarter-length, with blue eyes, brown dark hair, seated holding violin on lap, wearing blue gown and gilt filigree necklace, in background stamped leather screen or similar.

Conservationback to top

Conserved, 1982.

Provenanceback to top

Purchased from Christopher Wood 1981.

Exhibitionsback to top

Summer Exhibition, Royal Academy, London, 1874 (815).

Recent Acquisitions, NPG, London, 1982.

Reproductionsback to top

Surtees 1993, pl.13 (b/w).

View all known portraits for Caroline Blanche Elizabeth (née FitzRoy), Lady Lindsay