Sibell, Countess Grosvenor. 1886. Watercolour and gouache on paper; Dimensions unknown. Private collection. Click on image to enlarge it.
Lady Sibell Mary Lumley (1855-1929) was the daughter of Richard Lumley, 9th Earl of Scarborough. In 1874 she married Victor Alexander Grosvenor, Earl Grosvenor, the son of Hugh Lupus Grosvenor, 1st Duke of Westminster. Victor died at the young age of thirty in 1884. In 1887 Sibell married George Wyndham (1863-1913), a soldier, Conservative politician, statesman, and a member of The Souls. He was the elder son of the Honourable Percy Wyndham and the grandson of George Wyndham, 1st Baron Leconfield.
Clifford’s portrait of Sibell was executed in 1886, the year prior to her remarriage. In view of her beauty it is not difficult to a understand why her brother Osric Lumley calculated that after her first husband’s death more than eighty men of the most eligible kind were in love with her, particularly George Curzon. Abdy and Gere had these comments on Lady Grosvenor and on Clifford’s portrait of her:
Sibell Grosvenor’s character is elusive. She was very beautiful, very good, and very religious. Nobody ever said she was witty or clever; yet she was much loved in the Souls’ circle where these gifts were so greatly valued. Perhaps her very lack of self assertiveness was needed as a foil to the brilliance of her husband…Sibell Grosvenor’s looks were of the type known as journalière, ‘changing with the day’, depending on mood, the play of light, and, to a certain extent, the sympathy of the observer. She was like a painting rather than a piece of sculpture, and many respects she resembled a portrait by Greuze - a painter whom she greatly admired - so the likeness may not have been entirely fortuitous. Edward Clifford‘s portrait of her also has a slight echo of Greuze, showing her in a misty, muslin dress, slightly dishevelled, in a way reminiscent of the eighteenth century, against the background of soft, pale green trees. Certainly the gauzy clothes were appropriate to the image. Her most frequently remarked feature, clearly seen in the painting, was the sweetness of her expression and it did not belie the owners character. [97-98]
Abdy and Gere also describe her fondness for artists: “She enjoyed the society of artists: Burne-Jones was a friend, as were his children, who had been the companions of George Wyndham’s childhood. But she was especially attached to Edward Clifford, with whom she shared an interest in religious matters” (98). Clifford was a frequent guest at their country house Saighton Grange in Cheshire. She used his painting of the gardens at Saighton for her personal postcard for her correspondence.
Bibliography
Abdy, Jane and Charlotte Gere. The Souls. London: Sidgwick & Jackson, 1984.
Last modified 5 February 2023