A Lady of the Spencer Family
- Artist: Sir Anthony Van Dyck
- Date: c.1633–8
- Medium: Oil paint on canvas
- Dimensions: support: 2076 x 1276 mm
- Museum: Tate Britain
- Collection record: Tate Britain website
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About this artwork
This is the “A Lady of the Spencer Family” by Sir Anthony Van Dyck, painted around 1633–38. The oil on canvas shows a young woman in a pale blue satin gown, poised as if stepping across a terrace, her gaze turning back over her shoulder. Her dress is trimmed with a red waistband and bows, and she wears pearl jewellery that catches the light. Beside her, a small spaniel leaps at a lizard clinging to a rusticated pedestal – a classic symbol of fidelity, hinting at a recent engagement or marriage.
Van Dyck, born in Antwerp, trained under Rubens and absorbed the Venetian palette before moving to London in 1632, where he became Charles I’s principal painter. This portrait is a textbook example of his ability to blend courtly elegance with lively movement, influencing English portraitists for centuries, from Gainsborough to Sargent.
The sitter’s identity remains uncertain; scholars suspect she might have been a young Spencer, perhaps Elizabeth, daughter of William Spencer, who married in 1634. The work was first recorded at Althorp in the 18th century and entered a national collection in 1977 after a Grant‑in‑Aid purchase.
The painting’s frame is a later Sunderland piece, added to fit the canvas, but the canvas itself bears Van Dyck’s signature touch—soft brushwork, careful rendering of texture, and a subtle play of light that brings the scene to life. It’s a masterful snapshot of 17th‑century aristocratic fashion and the subtleties of symbolic gesture.
See it in person
A Lady of the Spencer Family is in the collection of Tate Britain on Millbank, London — free to enter. Point your phone at any artwork there and audioguide.london plays a free audio guide in six languages — no app download needed.
