Dorothy Wilding (photographer)
Princess Margaret
London: c. 1950
Black and white photograph
Inscription and stamp verso
9.75 x 8 inches, overall
Provenance: Estate of James Carr
Sold, please inquire as to the availability of similar items.
Princess Margaret
Portrait by Dorothy Wilding
Portrait by Dorothy Wilding
This item is sold. It has been placed here in our online archives as a service for researchers and collectors.
- Please inquire as to the availability of similar items currently in stock, or use the navigation bar above to browse our site for currently available items.
- Find guidelines for the use of images from georgeglazer.com.
- To see more archived items, view our directory.
- Find information about selling your art and antiques.
Portrait of Princess Margaret Rose (1930-2002), Countess of Snowdon, as a young woman, by the prominent portrait photographer Dorothy Wilding, who made a number of official photographs of the royal family. The inscription on the back indicates that it was apparently used in a publication.
The daughter of King George IV and Queen Elizabeth, the Queen Mother, and younger sister to Queen Elizabeth II, she began carrying out public engagements at a young age, accompanying her parents on their official visit to South Africa in 1947. She was married to Antony Armstrong-Jones, who became Lord Snowden, in 1960 and had two children. The marriage ended in 1978. As an adult, she actively participated in ceremonial functions as well as charitable activities and organizations, with a particular interest in social welfare and the arts, serving as patron or president of some 80 organizations.
Dorothy Wilding was a British photographer who learned the medium as an apprentice to Bond Street photographer Marian Neilson, and opened her own London studio at age 21. By the late 1920s, she had become a leading society portrait photographer, with a distinctive style characterized by smooth, uncluttered compositions; strong tonal contrasts and skillful lighting. Her clientele included members of the royal family and British aristocracy as well as prominent intellectuals and people in the arts, including the Duke and Duchess of Windsor, George Bernard Shaw and Noël Coward. In 1937, she became the first woman appointed as the Official Royal Photographer for a coronation, that of King George IV. That year she also opened a second studio in New York, and subsequently traveled back and forth on ocean liners. Wilding took the photographs of both King George IV and Queen Elizabeth II that were used on stamps, currency and banknotes in Britain and countries in the British Commonwealth, including the ubiquitous portrait of Queen Elizabeth appearing on stamps from 1952 to 1967. After retiring from photography in 1957, she published an autobiography, In Pursuit of Perfection the following year. The British National Portrait Gallery has 260 of her portraits in their collection and houses her archives; in 1991 they mounted a major retrospective of her work and published a catalog titled The Pursuit of Perfection.
Inscription verso: “Social Review Sq. H. T. 120 Screen deep etch”
Stamped verso: PLEASE ACKNOWLEDGE/ CAMERA PORTRAIT BY/ DOROTHY WILDING/ 10 EAST 75th ST. N.Y.C./ AND LONDON
References:
“Dorothy Wilding.” National Portrait Gallery, UK. http://www.npg.org.uk/live/search/person.asp?LinkID=mp07951&role=art (20 August 2004).
“Dorothy Wilding.” Anteque-a-Day. 25 December 2003. http://www.anteques.com/srv/antaday/3487.htm (20 August 2004).
“HRH the Princess Margaret 1930-2002.” The Royal Family. http://www.royal.gov.uk/output/page950.asp (27 August 2004).
Symes, Peter. “The Portraits of Queen Elizabeth II as they appear on World Banknotes.” P.J. Symes. 2003. http://www.pjsymes.com.au/QE2/QE2-intro.htm (20 August 2004).