This portrait is by Christopher Steele, a Kendal based painter to whom Romney was apprenticed from 1755. For four years he worked in Steele’s studio, learning the business of portraiture – mixing paint, preparing canvases and learning how to use a brush.

Steele, however, was not a model teacher and Romney spent much of his time appeasing angry creditors and finishing incomplete portraits. As a result of these difficulties, Romney ended his training with Steele and eventually set up his own business in Kendal. Although his apprenticeship was challenging, the experience helped him to understand how to run his own studio in a more efficient way.