Edward Wortley Montagu (1713–1776), MP

Edward Wortley Montagu (1713–1776), painted by Romney in 1775 and held at the Sheffield Galleries, presents one of the most colourful figures of the Georgian period. Son of the celebrated Lady Mary Wortley Montagu — who had introduced smallpox inoculation to England and whose letters remain essential reading for the period — Edward was her wayward child, who converted to Islam, lived in Egypt, and repeatedly embarrassed his family with his unconventional behaviour. Romney painted him just a year before his death, and the portrait sits at the intersection of celebrity and scandal that attracted the painter to many of his sitters. The Sheffield holding of this work reflects the dispersal of Romney portraits through regional collections, far from the London social world in which they were originally made.

The portrait of so distinctive a personality as Wortley Montagu offered Romney the opportunity to convey character beyond the conventional requirements of status portraiture. Whether he chose to deploy orientalising costume elements that reflected the sitter's Islamic conversion and Egyptian residency is unknown without examining the work directly, but the commission would have been one of the more unusual of his career. Romney's handling would follow his mature method while potentially engaging with the exotic dimension of the sitter's self-presentation.