Attributed to William Hamilton, R.A. (1751-1801) Portrait of Emily La Touche playing the harp; and Portrait of Lady Lanesborough and her sister Miss La Touche, three-quarter-length in white dresses in a wooded landscape, reading. The first with identifying inscription 'Miss La Touche by Hamilton' (on an old label on the reverse), pastel on paper, both in French Rococo style 19th century frames 29" (73.7cms) x 21" (53.3cms) Provenance: Presumably by inheritance through Harriet La Touche, who married Sir Nicholas Colthurst, 3rd Bt., High Sheriff of Co. Cork in 1788, to Captain Charles Colthurst-Vesey of Lucan House, CO. Dublin. The trustees of the Swithland Settled Estates, removed from the Swithland Hall; Christie's, 20 March 1979, lot 120 (£750) Literature: W.G. Strickland, Dictionary of Irish Artists, 1913, I, p.448 N. Jeffares, The Dictionary of Pastellists before 1800, London, online ed., p.19 Note: The sitters were daughters of David La Touche,(1704-1785), of Bellevue, Delgany, Co. Wicklow and the granddaughters of David Digges Ta Touche (1671-1745). Their grandfather, the founder of the Irish branch of the family was a Hugenot who had fled from France after the revocation of the Edict of Nantes in 1685 and eventually settled in Dublin, where he became a successful banker, founding the Dublin bank. Their father built Bellevue in 1754. Elizabeth La Touche, the eldest of the sisters, married Robert, 3rd Earl of Lanesborough; Emily became Mrs. Vesey. Hamilton was born in London, the son of a Scottish born clerk of works employed in the offices of the architect Robert Adam. Under Adam's encouragement, Hamilton travelled through Italy from 766 to 1768, where it is said he courted Angelica Kauffman. First employed by Adam as a decorative painter, Hamilton developed a grand style of History and portrait painting, first exhibiting at the Royal Academy in 1774. Elected a full Academician in 1789, there are examples of Hamilton's portraits, in both oil and on paper, at the National Portrait Gallery, London.