Miss Nelly O’Brien.

James Wilson after Sir Joshua Reynolds

Miss Nelly O’Brien.

London, c. 1790

Mezzotint

510x350mm

£120

A three quarter length, seated portrait of this celebrated courtesan and friend of Sir Joshua Reynolds, seated in a garden leaning with her left elbow resting on a classical sarcophagus. She looks up smiling, and wears pearls in her hair and round her neck, a lowcut gauze fichu with full sleeves and a flowing dark, satin skirt. Nelly O’Brien (d. 1768), became the mistress of the 3^rd Viscount Bolingbroke. She was one of Sir Joshua’s favourite sitters and this is one of his most charming portraits.