IT was a portrait that changed a life. When Sarah Biffin (1784–1850) set out to paint George Douglas, 16th Earl of Morton, at a county fair in the early 19th century, it marked the start of a successful artistic career that would see her portray royalty and become miniature painter to The Prince of Orange and Princess Augusta. Quite the feat for any artist, but all the more so for someone who held a brush with her teeth and shoulder. Biffin had been born in East Quantoxhead, Somerset, with no arms or legs. She seemed destined for a life as a fairground attraction after impresario Emmanuel Dukes persuaded her to join his troupe; there, she painted pictures for which he charged three guineas apiece. A lucky encounter with Lord Morton and his subsequent patronage—he paid for her to have lessons with miniature painter William Craig—allowed her to open a studio in London’s Bond Street. Soon, she counted the pinnacle of British Society among her clients. ‘She was a very talented painter,’ says Lawrence Hendra of art dealer Philip Mould, who mounted an award-winning exhibition of her work at the end of 2022. ‘To have succeeded at a time when opportunities for young disabled women were so restricted is remarkable and is a testament not only to her strength of will, but also her undeniable talents.’
‘The “unexpected slant on motherhood” is quite a coded work. She deserves to get a better name’
Determination in the face of adversity isn’t the only reason Biffin is interesting. She belongs to a cadre of lesser-known painters from early modern Europe who deserve to become more widely to the National Gallery. Several other female artists, however, are only now starting to capture the country’s attention. Biffin is one; another is a near-contemporary French artist, Marguerite Gérard (1761–1837). Her sister married Jean-Honoré Fragonard and Gérard became her brother-in-law’s pupil. This was the springboard for a successful career that allowed her to support herself (she never married) and even saw her sell a painting to Napoleon Bonaparte. shows the French emperor granting the Princess of Hatzfeld reprieve for her husband, but Gérard, who was influenced by late-17th-century Dutch art, favoured intimate, domestic scenes, such as , which The Barber Institute of Fine Arts in Birmingham acquired in March 2020. ‘She was a very refined artist,’ says The Barber’s Robert Wenley, who finds Gérard’s work particularly intriguing: , for example, has ‘an unexpected slant on motherhood’, showing a woman reading a book as her son stands beside her, seemingly ignored. ‘It’s quite a coded work. She deserves to get a better name.’
