Mary Little, later Lady Carr

Mary Little, later Lady Carr, painted around 1763 and held at the Yale Center for British Art, is a portrait from Gainsborough's mature Bath period when his female portrait practice had achieved its characteristic blend of social elegance and natural grace. Mary Little was painted before her marriage to Sir John Carr, and the portrait documents her appearance at this moment of social transition. Gainsborough had moved to Bath in 1759, and the Bath years transformed both his technical refinement and his social access: the fashionable visitors who came to Bath for the waters were some of the grandest in England, and Gainsborough's ability to render female beauty with a combination of physical immediacy and atmospheric softness made him their preferred portraitist. The Yale Center for British Art holds the work in a collection specifically focused on British art from the sixteenth century to the present, assembled by Paul Mellon as one of the great acts of cultural philanthropy in American history.

Oil on canvas executed with Gainsborough's characteristic feathery brushwork, employing thin, translucent glazes over a warm ground. The delicate handling of fabrics and the luminous flesh tones demonstrate his Van Dyck-influenced technique at its most refined.