A Portrait of Berkeley and Keppel Craven by John Hoppner

    This double portrait of two of Elizabeth Craven's sons, Henry Augustus Berkeley Craven and Richard Keppel Craven, by John Hoppner (1758-1810) is currently owned by the Indianapolis Museum of Art in the USA. It is dated on the museum website 1800, when Berkeley and Keppel (as they were always known) were aged 24 and 21 respectively. I wonder if it was done a little earlier, because Keppel does not look as if he is more than eighteen.

    The painting is, according to the curator of the museum, neither signed nor dated. Apparently Hoppner never did sign his pictures, nor did he keep a record of this commission, so attribution depends on contemporary references and on style. Nevertheless, Hoppner experts all agree that it is his work.

    Until 1821, the portrait used to hang at Brandenburgh House, the London home of Elizabeth Craven after she married the Margrave of Anspach. It was seen there by the MP Thomas Creevey when he visited the house in that year.

In a letter from Mr. Creevey to Miss Ord, 21 Feb., 1821, the writer, describing a visit to Brandenberg House, Hammersmith, the residence of Lady Craven (Margravine of Anspach) — and afterwards that of Queen Caroline — says, " There is a capital picture by Hoppner of Berkeley and Keppel Craven " (1) 

He was there as Keppel's guest, so had the best possible authority about the artist. The painting was also seen there by the Margravine's nephew, Grantley Fitzhardinge Berkeley, an author and MP. He describes it in his Recollections as a "life-size portrait of Berkeley and Keppel Craven, the former a very handsome young man, leaning on the shoulder of his brother." Although he attributes it to Romney, it is undoubtedly this painting.(2) 

    One reason the two brothers are shown in Van Dyck costume is probably that this links them to the early Stuart period when the Craven family first rose to prominence and their ancestor was created the first Earl of Craven. Another possibility is that they are being depicted in their costumes for one of the plays that their mother loved to put on in her private theatre.

    When the contents of Brandenburgh House were sold, the paintings were moved to Benham, and Elizabeth Craven's Memoirs, written in 1826, mentions that it is there. "The picture of me by Romney, which was at Brandenburgh House, and is now, with that of my two sons Berkeley and Keppel, removed to Benham..."(3)

After her death, Keppel shipped the painting out to Naples where it adorned his villa, and remained there during his son's life. 

"Early in 1853 Mr. Craven [Keppel's son] had decided, after much hesitation, to make his home at Naples. The Palazzino Chiatamone, or, as it came to be known to all their acquaintances, the Casa Craven, was transformed by the improvements Mr. Craven made in its arrangements. In front it commanded the Bay of Naples, and to the west was Posilippo. On either side of the entrance-hall were the dining-room and Mrs. Craven's sitting-room, full of books and beautiful things. Mr. Keppel Craven had decorated the chief reception room in what is called the style of the First Empire. Its walls were painted in shades of umber, and  massive gilt cornices of classical design framed four large mirrors as well as two life-size pictures by Romney - a full-length portrait of the Margravine of Anspach in one, and of Mr. Craven's father and uncle, Keppel and Berkeley Craven, in the other. Beyond the dining-room, with its choice pictures and fine porcelain, was the spacious and well-filled library. It was arranged in the shape of a Greek cross, of which the book-shelves, carrying some eight thousand volumes, formed the arms; while in the centre was comfortable space for study.

The room was lighted from a wide balcony looking south upon the sea, and on the east side it opened on the terrace, behind which rose a rugged buttress of the hill Echia." (4)

Palazzo Chiatamone, Naples, where the painting once hung.

In 1880, shortly before the death of Keppel's son, the painting came up for auction at Christie's in London. 

This picture, " a canvas with whole-length portraits of the Hon. Berkeley and Keppel Craven, sons of Lord Craven," was offered, with a portrait of Lady Craven, all three described as by George Romney, at Christie's, 29 May, 1880, and were bought in. (5) 

The painting did not sell, and must have been bequeathed by Keppel's son's widow to the Cravens in England, because in 1968 it came up again for auction, at Sotheby's, as part of the Craven estate. It was acquired by a buyer named Agnew, and it was displayed in 1971 in an exhibition about 'English Life and Landscape'. Since then, it has crossed the Atlantic. (6)

    The book George Romney by Arthur B. Chamberlain refers a portrait of Berkeley and Keppel Craven by Romney.  Could it be that the author was referring to the same painting but taking the opinion of Grantley Berkeley, or Christie's catalogue, about its attribution? Maybe he understood the passage in the Margravine's Memoirs to imply that both paintings were by Romney. (7) 

    To complicate the matter, it is recorded that at Berkeley Castle there is an engraving by H. F. Davey of a double portrait of Keppel and Berkeley Craven taken from an original said to be by Ozias Humphry. Could this be the same painting again? (8) 

    Another work of Hoppner's possibly sheds light on this one. In 1800, Hoppner painted a double portrait of Lady Georgiana and Lady Maria Molyneux, the daughters of Lady Sefton, who was the sister of Keppel and Berkeley Craven. This painting was apparently displayed at the Royal Academy in July 1800 under the title of "The Molyneux Children." The 1909 biography of Hoppner lists it as:-

MOLYNEUX CHILDREN, THE CHILDREN of William Philip Molyneux, 2nd Earl of Sefton, who married, 1 Jan., 1792, Maria, daughter of William, 6th Lord Craven. The children are: Georgiana Isabella Frances, eldest child, born 15 Dec, 1792; married, 22 June, 1819, Charles Pascoe Grenfell, Esq.; died 27 June, 1826; and her next sister, Maria, born 22 Feb., 1795. Royal Academy, 1800, No. 104. Two whole-length figures of children from six to nine years of age, in a landscape ; the elder to right, directed to left and looking at the spectator, the younger directed to front and looking at spectator; both in white dresses, with purple waistbands, white stockings and black shoes, each with a coral necklace. Canvas, 50 x 40 in. Exhibited at Messrs. P. and D. Colnaghi and Co.'s Galleries, May, 1905, No. 2. Note. — "Displays taste and fancy. The attitudes of the children are easy and natural; the heads are painted with great spirit, and the colouring, both of the figures and background, is rich and harmonious." — Monthly Mirror, July, 1800, p. 15.  (9)

    It survives in a National Trust collection somewhere, and this black and white photograph of it is available on an NT website:

https://www.nationaltrustcollections.org.uk/object/23337

These two charming little girls, aged eight and six, are the granddaughters of Elizabeth Craven, and the nieces of Berkeley and Keppel. Perhaps Lady Sefton saw the recent portrait of her two brothers by Hoppner and chose him to paint her two daughters, or perhaps Lady Sefton recommended the artist to her mother, who then commissioned that of Berkeley and Keppel.

The fact that Hoppner was definitely working for the Craven family at this date, and that what he painted was a double portrait of two sisters, can be taken to corroborate the attribution to him of the full-length painting of Berkeley and Keppel.

(1) Creevey Papers, vol. ii, p. 14.

(2) Grantley Fitzhardinge Berkeley, My Life and Recollections (1866) 4:164.

(3) E. Craven, Memoirs, Vol,1:8.

(4) Maria Catherine Bishop, A Memoir of Mrs. Augustus Craven (Pauline de La Ferronnays)(1896) p.55.

(5) Ward and Roberts, " Romney," Catalogue Raisonne," p. 35. MacKay and Roberts, John Hoppner, RA, ((London:Colnaghi,  1909) p. 59.

(6) https://www.npg.org.uk/collections/search/personExtended/mp01093/keppel-richard-craven?tab=iconography

(7)  Chamberlain, George Romney (Methuen, 1910) p 328, 334.

(8) The English Illustrated Magazine, Volume 6 p. 7.

(9) MacKay and Roberts. John Hoppner RA .p.172.