CIRCLE OF FRANCISCO JOSÉ DE GOYA Y LUCIENTES (1746-1828) Portrait of María del Rosario Fernandéz, called ‘La Tirana after the painting in the Museo de la Real Academia de San Fernando, Madrid.

oil on canvas 76.5 x 57.2 cm PROVENANCE: Richard Frank Heathcoat-Amory (1903-1957) Posthumous sale at Sotheby’s, London, 27.06.1962, lot 86, as ‘F. Goya’. Anonymous sale; Sotheby Parke Bernet, London, 8 July 1981, lot 150, as ‘F. Goya’. Giancarlo Baroni; Posthumous sale at Sotheby’s, New York, 1 February 2013, lot 186. Christie’s, London, ‘Visions of Collecting: Royal and Aristocratic, An Important Private Collection’, 19.09.2019 EXHIBITED: New York, Knoedler Gallery, Goya, 1934. María del Rosario Fernández (Seville, 1755–Madrid, 1803) was a prominent Spanish actress. Her husband, Francisco Castellanos, was also an actor and was known as ‘El Tirano’ (The Tyrant) because of the characters he played alongside her. Rosario Fernández’s nickname, ‘La Tirana’, was the female equivalent. Goya painted two portraits of La Tirana: a three-quarter-length portrait in 1794, the year she retired from the stage, and a full-length portrait in 1799. The latter is now in the Museo de la Real Academia de San Fernando in Madrid. The latter, a life-sized canvas measuring 206 cm, was donated to the Academia by La Tirana’s niece and is recorded there from 1816. It must have been very famous in its day, as it was copied many times. When the painting was offered for sale at Sotheby’s in 1962, it was accompanied by a letter from A. L. Mayer, who suggested that the portrait was an autograph work by Goya and a smaller version of the artist’s painting in the Basilica of San Fernando. He also proposed that the painting may have been made for Don Diego Colón, a descendant of Christopher Columbus and a friend of the actress. This assumption has no basis, but Mayer probably suggested it because it is thought that she bequeathed another portrait of herself by Goya to Colón. (Quoted from the Sotheby’s auction catalogue, 2013.) The former owner, Richard Frank Heathcoat-Amory (1903–1957), was a lieutenant in the 4th Hussars and a senior partner at the stockbroking firm Stirling Amory. He was also secretary at the British Embassy in Washington from 1939 to 1942. He was the grandson of Sir John Amory, later Heathcoat-Amory, 1st Baronet, who was created in 1874.