‘Lady in Blue’ (Lady Berwick)

Walter Richard Sickert, RA (Munich 1860 – Bathampton 1942). Oil painting on canvas, ‘Lady in Blue’ (Edith Teresa Hulton, Lady Berwick) by Walter Richard Sickert, RA (Munich 1860 – Bathampton 1942), signed, upper left: Sickert, 1933/34. A three-quarter-length portrait, standing, right turned to left, head facing, wearing a blue figured dress and coat, short hair, her right hand on her hip, beside an armchair with blue cushions in an interior hung with paintings. Edith Teresa Hulton, Lady Berwick (1890-1972) was the daughter of William Stokes Hulton (1852-1921) and Costanza Mazini (1863–1939). She married Thomas Henry Noel-Hill, 8th Baron Berwick of Attingham (1877-1947) on 30 June 1919. Painted from photographs the artist took, Lady Berwick wrote: "No one could call it a portrait, it is a fantasia in a characteristic subdued colour scheme. Both pictures had narrow gilt frames and were signed by Sickert at the Alvaston Place flat on 10 January 1934." The silk crepe dress which Lady Berwick wore for this portrait (printed in grey and grey blue with a scattered leaf design) was described by her as 'Blue Summer Dress'. It was made in Florence in 1930 and is still in the costume collection at Attingham Park. Attingham Park, Shropshire (Accredited Museum)