Mrs. Robert Lowden

In this portrait, most likely commissioned to celebrate the sitter’s marriage to Robert Lowden, Henry Inman lavishly rendered Jane Lowden in a red velvet gown. Such flattering likenesses, captured with exuberant fluidity, made Inman one of the most popular midcentury portraitists. Despite his success, Inman felt somewhat stifled by the “rage for portraits” and wished he could devote more time to painting landscapes or genre scenes, subjects that he considered of “higher and purer taste.”