A new book from Manchester University Press explores the relationship between English country houses and the portraits that adorn their walls. Edited by Gill Perry, Kate Retford and Jordan Vibert, the book contains essays by Desmond Shawe Taylor, Harriet Guest, Emma Barker, Susie West, Alison Yarrington and Ruth Kenny.
Contents
Introduction: placing faces in the country house
Part 1: A walk around the house
1. The topography of the conversation piece: a walk around Wanstead – Kate Retford
2. Life in the library – Susie West
3. Marble, memory and theatre: portraiture and the sculpture gallery at Chatsworth – Alison Yarrington
PART 2: Women’s space?
4. Dirty dancing at Knole: portraits of Giovanna Baccelli and the performance of ‘Public Intimacy’ – Gill Perry
5. ‘Necessary, usefull, easy and delightfull’; the production and display of pastel portraits in the English country house – Ruth Kenny
6. Georgiana at Althorp: Spencer family portraits 1755–1783 – Emma Barker
PART 3: Imperial Designs
7. Commemorating Captain Cook in the country estate – Harriet Guest
8. Framing Sir Francis: Lady Anne Stanhope and the corruption of civic masculinity – Jordan Vibert
9. The Waterloo Chamber before the Battle of Waterloo – Desmond Shawe Taylor
Melbourne Portrait Group 