Peaches and Cream

Samuel Shelley is critically acclaimed for his miniature portraits of ladies and children and this serene portrait provides easy confirmation of that. It features a bright-eyed young lady in a white gown trimmed with ropes of pearls and blue ribbon. Her powdered hair is worn à la conseilleur decorated with a pearl-edged comb and with curls falling over her shoulders.

The portrait is set in a silver gilt frame that is glazed on the reverse to show cream silk.

Coming from a modest background, Samuel Shelley (1756-1808) is thought to have been self-taught before he entered the Royal Academy Schools at the age of seventeen. He developed a distinctive style of painting that often conveyed the character of his sitters. He exhibited widely between 1772 and 1804 and ran a fashionable London studio.