A thankless child. Georgiana Jane Keate (1771-1850) by Susan Bennett MA

I have been chosen by a girl born in 1771 to write her life story.  This will appear under the title 'A thankless child'.  Earlier research into her artistic activity led to the award of a Research MA by Birkbeck College in 2004.  My dissertation was subsequently published by Verlag and was reviewed in the newsletter of the William Shipley Group for RSA History in October 2010.

Book review

‘I awleis  admired your talent’. The artistic life of Georgiana Jane Henderson (nee Keate) 1771-1850 by Susan Bennett.  Germany: VDM Verlag Dr. Müller, 2008  

This beautifully written and illustrated study of a genteel and artistic young woman in Georgian England makes an important contribution to our knowledge of the period. Drawing upon the hitherto unknown diaries of Georgiana Henderson and various secondary sources, Susan Bennett has recreated the story of a talented daughter of upper class parents who married an amateur artist against her parents’ wishes but whose life as a daughter, wife and mother of five children mirrored many conventions of the times.

                 

What makes this book especially valuable is its wealth of detail on the artistic education and daily social life of such young ladies. Watercolour painting was deemed more suitable as an accomplishment for ladies as it minimised the soiling of “their fair hands” which painting with oils could cause. Composition in watercolour became a distinguishing characteristic of gentility amongst female artists and exhibitions of art by the Royal Academy reinforced the socially permissive traditions of the time: that painting of flowers, landscapes and portraits were subjects for females while historical themes featured more in the work of male artists. The Society of Arts played an important role in encouraging a love of the ‘Polite Arts’ by awarding prizes for excellence in drawing by boys and girls. The inclusion of Pugin and Rowlandson’s engraving of a prize distribution (fig.16) emphasises the large number of girls as well as boys waiting to accept their awards. Georgiana’s attendance at such annual occasions with her parents and future husband, John Henderson, brought her into contact with both esteemed art works of the period and its patrons. The building for the Society of Arts, designed by the architect Robert Adam as part of the Adelphi scheme, reinforced the grandeur of these social gatherings.

Bennett’s study illustrates and explains many aspects of the social life of the elite classes in the later eighteenth century. Continental wars mitigated against the traditional destinations of the ‘Grand Tour’ making picturesque scenes of England popular artistic choices. Fashionable spa resorts featured in many paintings and Georgiana’s picture of Hall’s Library in Margate (fig. 31) shows the importance of such institutions not only as social spaces but also as a shop for books, toys and games. The many plates included in this book on Georgiana Henderson reveal some fascinating details as explained in the text, for example  the portraits of Chevalier and Madam D’Eon (fig. 63), the secret agent for the French King who hid under woman’s clothing to aid his mission to Russia. This volume will be of interest to both the general reader and to students of art, social and women’s history of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries.

Dr Jana Sims

(for links with the RSA see also WSG Occasional Paper 3 The Henderson connection: new discoveries into a family of artists and collectors linked with the Society of Arts by Susan Bennett)