This attractive silhouette was painted around 1817 when the artist, Edward Foster, was working from a studio in Harrogate as evidenced by his trade label on the reverse. The young lady wears a high-waisted dress with studded sleeve decoration and a pretty spotted voile fill-in, her hair upswept and held in place with an ornamental comb.Painted on card with details picked out in gum arabic and Chinese white, the profile resides in the original papier-måché frame with a decorative surround, a (now strangely flattened but still usable) hanger and backed with the artist’s trade label no. 3 (trimmed to an oval with loss to some text). With sittings lasing no longer than one minute, Foster promised accurate likenesses with the promise of a full refund if not satisfied.Edward Foster was a prolific artist whose artistic career spanned more than two decades. He worked with the aid of a profile-capturing machine and travelled extensively across the north of England. He also spent time in...