LONDON.- A rediscovered work by Thomas Lawrence and his studio comes for sale at Chiswick Auctions on January 21. On the market for the first time, the oil on canvas portrait of Caroline, Lady Suffield of Belton Hall in Grantham is expected to bring £40,000 - £60,000 as part of a designated sale of Old Masters & 19th Century Art.

Lady Caroline Hobart (d. 1850) was the second of the three daughters of John Hobart, 2nd Earl of Buckinghamshire (1723-93) and his first wife, Mary Anne Drury. At the death of her father she inherited the Blickling Estate, now the property of the National Trust.

This half-length portrait of Lady Caroline, that shows the sitter in an unusual pose with head turned sharply to the right, is the second version of this image known. It largely repeats a three-quarter-length version of the canvas that was exhibited at the Royal Academy in 1793 (when Lawrence was just 24 years old) that remains in the collection of her descendants.

It is thought the commission for both portraits was prompted by the sitter’s marriage to the Hon. William Asheton Harbord (1766-1821) on June 4, 1792. The larger version was probably intended for the sitter’s father, and this picture for her husband.

Although commissioned in 1793, neither of the portraits of Lady Caroline were delivered until after Lawrence’s death in 1830. Lawrence’s famously disorganized studio and the death of Lord Buckinghamshire in August 1793 may have contributed to the amnesia regarding the portraits.

Both canvases were included in a manuscript inventory of nearly 150 portraits made by Lawrence’s executor, Archibald Knightley. Both were sold to the sitter in November 1832.

The larger painting that appears to be an entirely autograph work was bought by the sitter for £52.10s. The smaller version, perhaps completed by one of Lawrence’s assistants, after his death cost £26.5s. It comes for sale by family descent.

Chiswick Auctions specialist Luke Price commented: “It has never been to the market before. As far as we are aware it has been in private hands for decades within the same family.

“The work is inscribed and titled on the reverse so there was always that connection with the artist. However, we suggested that it was a sophisticated hand and showed it to the art historian Hugh Belsey who confirmed our cataloguing.”