Thomas Gainsborough portraits to go on show for first time in the UK
Gainsborough's previously unseen works, which could be worth around £500,000 if ever sold, will be displayed at Dunster Castle in Somerset.
The portraits were painted for members of a family which were related by marriage to the aristocratic owners of the castle and have been in the family ever since.
The pictures show the Honourable George Somerville and his daughter Ann on the day of her wedding to Reverend Thomas Fownes in 1764.
She is wearing a white silk dress and is holding a sprig of myrtle - which is linked to the Greek goddess of beauty Aphrodite. He his dressed in the red coat of Dragoon guardsman.
Rev Fownes' brother Henry married into the Luttrell family that owned the castle from the medieval period until they bequeathed it to the National Trust in 1976.
The 52ins (1.3m) by 40ins (1m) oil on wood paintings are contained in elaborate guilt frames and will adorn the castle's opulent dining room walls until November.
They will hang next to some Joshua Reynolds' portraits of other members of the family...
Read entire article at Telegraph (UK)
The portraits were painted for members of a family which were related by marriage to the aristocratic owners of the castle and have been in the family ever since.
The pictures show the Honourable George Somerville and his daughter Ann on the day of her wedding to Reverend Thomas Fownes in 1764.
She is wearing a white silk dress and is holding a sprig of myrtle - which is linked to the Greek goddess of beauty Aphrodite. He his dressed in the red coat of Dragoon guardsman.
Rev Fownes' brother Henry married into the Luttrell family that owned the castle from the medieval period until they bequeathed it to the National Trust in 1976.
The 52ins (1.3m) by 40ins (1m) oil on wood paintings are contained in elaborate guilt frames and will adorn the castle's opulent dining room walls until November.
They will hang next to some Joshua Reynolds' portraits of other members of the family...