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Dimensions: measurements note 94 3/4 by 58 1/2 in.; 240.6 by 148.6 cm.

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Provenance: Arthur Chichester, 1υst Marquess of Donegall, the husband of the sitter;
By descent to his younger son Lord Spencer Stanley Chichester (1775-1819), Dunbrody Park, Co. Wexford;
By descent to his son Arthur Chichester, 1st Baron Templemore, (1797-1837), Co. Donegal;
By descent to Arthur Claud Spencer Chichester, 4υth Baron Templemore, Dunbrody Park, Co. Wexford;
With Duveen Brothers, Inc., New York, by 1926;
From whom acquired with a bloc of pictures by Norton Simon, Pasadena;
By whom sold London, Sotheby's, 27 June, 1973, lot 15;
J. G. Hood, Esq.;
By whom offered London, Christie's, 19 November, 1976, lot 82, presumably unsold, and from whom acquired directly by the present collector.

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Literature: H. Ward & W. Roberts, Romney, London 1904, vol. II, p. 45;
"Exhibitions in Aid of 'Adopt-A-Family' Campaign," in Connoisseur, vol. XCI, June 1933, p. 416;

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Notes: PROPERTY FROM A WEST COAST PRIVATE COLLECTION
When this Portrait of Barbara, Marchioness of Donegall was painted, Romney had became the unchallenged society portraitist in London. Gainsborough had died in 1788, and Reynolds died in February of 1792, just as the present painted was being started. It exemplifies the type of elegant and yet informal image--even in his grandest full-length portraits-- in which Romney had specialized. Romney had painted a number of such full length portraits of beautiful young ladies, set in dramatic park landscapes, over the 1780's, and into the early 1790's. They are often shown leaning on plinths or balustrades, dressed simply in fashionable white gowns, which the artist renders with fluid beauty. The attitude of the sitter in the present portait, in fact, is similar to a painting of a few years earlier, the Anne, Lady de la Pole (Boston, Museum of Fine Arts) of 1786, where the figure is posed with the same elegant nonchalence, one arm resting on a garden ledge, leaning against it with her ankles crossed. Barbara was the daughter of the Rev. Dr. Luke Godfrey, and married in October 1790, as his third wife, Arthur Chichester, 1st Marquess of Donegall. Sittings for her are recorded in Romney's day book in February, March and May of 1792. The painting was completed by March 24, 1796, when it was sent to the Marquess' English seat at Fisherwick Hall, near Lichfield, Staffordshire. Romney received payement of 120 guineas for the picture on 15 January, 1798.