Lady Teazle (after Robert Vonnoh)

Henry Wolf

Lady Teazle is a character in the Richard Brinsley Sheridan play ridiculing pretentiousness, The School for Scandal, first performed in 1777. Lady Teazle is a spendthrift married to an elderly man, and the play focuses on this relationship. She was noted for her elaborate wardrobe, which Henry Wolf captures, almost photographically, with the woodengraved line.

Earlier information we had obtained suggested that this was a portrait of noted British-born actress Julia Marlowe, who also played Lady Teazle during her successful career. However, a more recent dive into this work's history now suggests that it might have been a portrait of the lesser-known Empire Stock Theater actress Ethel Hornick, who retired in 1904 to marry Dr. William Wallace Walker. Evidence for this comes from the catalogue of the First Annual American Oil Painters exhibit at the Corcoran Gallery in Washington D.C., in 1907. Listed on page 47, entry 149 reads: "Vonnoh, Robert / "As Lady Teazle - Ethel Hornick" / lent by Dr. W.W.W."