Artist: Susannah-Penelope Rosse · about 1680Portrait of a Woman, presumed Self-Portrait
This is widely presumed to be a self-portrait of Susannah-Penelope Rosse. It offers a rare glimpse into the self-fashioning of a female artist in the seventeenth century. Rosse represents herself with thick dark-brown hair and distinctive gold earrings. These earrings are a subtle nod to her socio-economic power; as the wife of the wealthy jeweller Michael Rosse (1650-1735?), she was under no financial pressure. This allowed her to paint more for her own pleasure than for clients, shielding her from the precarious life of a commercial artist. Her self-portrait reflects a balance between her professional identity as a skilled limner and her status as a ‘fine-looking’ woman of the mercantile elite. In this context, the ‘power’ on display is not inherited, but authored.
Who is the Sitter?
This miniature is inscribed ‘Mrs. Rosse’. The sitter appears to be in her twenties or thirties, and her hairstyle dates it to about 1680. Therefore, it cannot represent the artist’s mother-in-law, Mrs Elizabeth Rosse, who was born around 1620.
It was painted by Susannah-Penelope Rosse. Her father was Richard Gibson (1615–1690), a miniaturist who learned to paint when he was a servant to King Charles I.
Although Rosse enjoyed more favourable economic circumstances and better opportunities for art education than other female painters of her time, few of her miniatures are known today. This might be because she rarely painted for clients, or perhaps because her identity as a woman made her less famous than her father, Richard Gibson, or her mentor and friend, Samuel Cooper, one of the most celebrated of all English miniaturists. However, it is undeniable that Rosse had excellent painting skills. In fact, it is very thought provoking that many paintings which were once believed to be by Cooper were later discovered to have been created by Rosse.
The sixteenth-century English Court boasted several female miniaturists, like Susannah Horenbout (1503–1554), Margaret Holsewyther (about 1504–after 1560) and Levina Teerlinc (1510s–1576). Most of them, like Susannah-Penelope Rosse, were introduced to miniature painting through their fathers or husbands who were also painters. Although there were many excellent painters among them, household management remained a priority for these middle-class women. For instance, Samuel Pepys (1633-1703), the celebrated English diarist, complained that:
‘…[I was troubled] to see my wife minding her paynting and not thinking of her house business, this being the first day of her beginning the second time to paynt.’ (3 May 1666)
Relationship to Power
This self-portrait reflects Rosse’s identity as a woman living in upper society.
During her career as a miniaturist, she had access to resources, people and spaces that most other women of her time could not reach (including working for members of the royal family). She painted relatively few portraits because she did not need to rely on painting to make a living. Her husband was extremely wealthy. However, even for such an artist with a prominent reputation, status and wealth, the breadth of her influence in the history of portrait painting was far less than that of her father.