The Hon. Mary Vernon, Mrs George (Adams) Anson (1739-1843)

Reynolds painted the Hon. Mary Vernon around 1764, a female portrait from the period when he had fully consolidated the approach to women's portraiture that would define his reputation for the following two decades. Reynolds's sitters from the gentry and aristocracy came to his Leicester Square studio with specific expectations about how they wished to be portrayed: elegant, assured, and youthful, but also possessed of the individual distinction that separated a Reynolds from a merely competent likeness. His achievement was to satisfy those expectations while maintaining the variety that distinguished his best work from workshop repetition. Mary Vernon's portrait belongs to the category of National Trust holdings that demonstrate how thoroughly Reynolds's work penetrated the great country houses of England: the Trust administers an extraordinary collection of Reynolds portraits that together constitute a survey of Georgian aristocratic culture. Reynolds's relationship with the landed gentry was reciprocal: they provided the commissions that funded his studio and social life, while he provided the images that established their dynastic identity for posterity.

The portrait presents the sitter with elegant composition and warm palette. Reynolds's handling creates an image of aristocratic feminine grace.