My name is Cameron Webster and I am a third year History of Art Student at the University of Edinburgh with a special interest in 17th-19th century portraiture. Because of this interest, I have been working with the North Lanarkshire Council on a research project regarding two of the historic portraits in their collection from the Dalzell House. I first identified these paintings as points of interest from their collections page before going to the Museum Store. When starting my placement these paintings were listed as, ‘Portrait of an Unknown Man’ by an unknown artist and, ‘Lady Margaret Belhaven, Daughter of the Duke of Hamilton’ by the school of Sir Anthony van Dyck.
My first day at the archive consisted of seeing these paintings in the flesh. We were instructed on the proper way in which to handle the pieces using gloves and unwrapping them from their acid free paper with great care. We first looked at Margaret Belhaven which was listed as being a detail copy of a painting in the National Gallery of Scotland. The canvas showed signs of damage but we were quite limited in being able to properly assess the condition due to the light level in the store.
It was quite a challenge to find the ‘Portrait of an Unknown Man’. This canvas also showed signs of damage, probably from when the painting was removed from Dalzell. After seeing this canvas, I had an inkling as to who the sitter might be. I knew I would need to prove this before conclusively stating my theory and would be focusing part of my research to this endeavour. My first list of things to try and find and consider was as follows:
-The Dalzell House inventory
-The Complete Works of Sir Anthony van Dyck catalogue
– Students of the studio of Anthony van Dyck
-Comparing writing and labels on paintings
-The family tree of Hamilton’s, Belhaven’s and Dalzell’s
-Looking at the rest of the Dalzell art collection
– Looking at the college of arms creation of the Barony of Belhaven
– Looking at the peerage of Scotland catalogue
I started in the Local Studies collection at the Motherwell Heritage Centre. Here I found several books relating to the Hamilton family and the beginnings of some research regarding the paintings that was conducted soon after Dalzell House first came under the ownership of the Council in 1967. The books included ‘Glasgow and Lanarkshire illustrated’ from the late 19th century and ‘The House of Hamilton’ from a similar date. From these I have gathered information on the life and times of Margaret Belhaven which has contributed to my overall understanding of the painting and helped me in perusing new lines of enquiry. I also found a book from the First World War (1914-1918) which contained photographs of Dalzell House during the time it was used as a hospital. In this there was a picture of the drawing room where it is possible to see the ‘Portrait of an Unknown Man’ hung to the left of the fireplace next to the window. It shows how the painting was actually imbedded within the panelling of the room which may be a reason as to why this painting was not taken with the family when they moved from Dalzell to Sussex in the 1950s.
Going forward with the research, we have been in contact with several galleries and institutions such as Christies and National Galleries of Scotland to try and find out as much as possible about these paintings. I am particularly excited by a lead I currently have which is an inventory of Ham House in 1679 which suggests that a painting of Lady Belhaven was in their collection at this time. I also have been handling contemporary letters and inventories in the National Archives in Edinburgh, some of which were written by Lady Margaret Belhaven herself. These have offered clues in terms of being able to track down the lives of these paintings and where they might have come from. I have now also managed to prove who the, ‘Portrait is an Unknown Man’ is. I believe that it is an 18th century portrait of James VI and I and appears to be after an engraving by Holland, Compton: Exchange (1616-1621. Being able to prove this has been a brilliant opportunity and we are currently in the process of updating the painting’s file on both the NLC Website and on Art UK.
Cameron Webster is a third-year Art History student at the Edinburgh College of Art. He has been conducting his placement with North Lanarkshire Council since January and has been focussing on the Dalzell House collection. In his spare time he works at The Georgian House for the National Trust for Scotland.