A Focus on the Function of Portrait Miniatures: Compton Verney’s The Reflected Self: Portrait Miniatures, 1550-1850

This September, an ambitious new major exhibition of portrait miniatures has opened at Warwickshire country house and gallery, Compton Verney. Co-curated by leading portrait miniatures specialist Emma Rutherford, of the Limner Company, the exhibition will bring together objects created by leading miniature painters from Britain.  

Through displaying these miniatures, The Reflected Self aims to demonstrate the purposes that the objects served during the period in which they were the only portable form of portraiture, until the introduction of Photography in the mid-nineteenth century. These purposes ranged from being sentimental keepsakes to objects through which entertainment could be provided. This latter purpose is displayed through one of the star loans, a pair of ‘talc’ miniatures of Charles I and a lady who may be his wife, Henrietta Maria. A set of overlays would have allowed the original owner to play dress-up with the sitters.  

Visitors will have the opportunity to see the works of some of the most important miniature painters in Britain from the period, from Nicholas Hilliard (c.1547-1619), Isaac Oliver (1556-1617) and Samuel Cooper (1609-1672) to Richard Cosway (1742-1821), John Smart (1741-1811) and George Engleheart (1750-1829). These have been brought together from numerous important miniature collections, including the Grantchester Miniatures collection at Compton Verney, the Dumas Egerton Trust collection, and other individual collections.  

Additional features in the exhibition also allow visitors to learn about the changing fashions that are often captured within these portraits. These include ruffs loaned from the Honiton Lace Shop, and Leather gauntlets loaned from Peter Finer. It is easy to see how some of the miniatures, like a gold bracelet inset with a miniature of Queen Victoria by William Essex (1784-1869), would have been worn as pieces of fashion themselves. Specially commissioned films also demonstrate the wearable nature of these objects.   

The pieces of art displayed are not only limited to the distant past, either. Contemporary artists Bettina von Zwehl (b.1971) and Volker Hermes (b.1972) are both represented, with their responses to the work of well-known miniaturists. Placed alongside the original works, these link the past purposes of these objects to the present, and provide visitors with an opportunity to reflect on how practices around miniatures in the past can be linked to ‘selfie culture’ and the use of social media and mobile phones today.   

This exhibition is ticketed, and can be booked through Compton Verney’s website.  

 21 September 2024 – 23 February 2025