A Fortune-Teller

Reynolds's A Fortune-Teller from 1777, at Waddesdon Manor, belongs to the category of 'fancy pictures' — small-scale, genre-inflected works that Reynolds distinguished from his formal portraiture and that allowed him to explore subjects outside the demands of likeness and social function. The subject of the fortune-teller, combining youth and age, beauty and occult knowledge, belonged to a tradition established in Italian and Northern European genre painting — Caravaggio's cardsharps and fortune-tellers, the Dutch genre tradition of Rembrandt's circle — that Reynolds was translating into British vernacular. The 1777 date places this work in his late mature period, when his technical command was most secure and when his fancy pictures were achieving a quality of atmospheric richness comparable to his best portraits. Waddesdon Manor, the Rothschild property in Buckinghamshire that houses one of the finest private art collections in Britain, holds this work alongside its extraordinary French decorative arts and old master paintings in a setting that reflects the collecting priorities of the late Victorian aristocracy.

Reynolds renders the scene with his characteristic warm palette and soft, blended brushwork. The careful rendering of the young woman's expectant expression and the fortune-teller's mysterious manner create an intimate narrative within an atmospheric setting.