American School: Pair of 18th Century Naïve Portraits
A charming pair of 18th Century naïve portraits of a married couple, she with elaborate head-dress incorporating flowers, a Spitalfields type silk dress with large floral corsage and a pendant initialled AJH, he with powdered wig en queue and simple grey coat and waistcoat with ornate buttons and with a lace jabot; oil on panel, presented in later Colefax & Fowler type painted frames
Spitalfields silk was highly prized in America. The Albany Institute of History and Art has a similar dress, the silk designed by Anna Maria Garthwaite and woven by Mr. Pulley of Spitalfields, almost certainly made for Christina Ten Broek Livingstone, 1718-1801, of Albany and New York City. It descended to her great, great grandson, John Woodworth Gould, whose wife, Harriet van Rensselaer, donated it to the Albany Institute. Anna Maria Garthwaite was an extraordinarily influential designer of rococo flowered silks at Spitalfields in the mid 18th century – illustrated is a design by her of 1747.
