A talk in association with Chatsworth’s current exhibition, Picturing Childhood: A New Perspective at Chatsworth (until 6 October).

Portrait miniatures were particularly significant when it came to recording childhood at Chatsworth. Portraits were often used to celebrate childhood milestones (for example when young boys were 'breeched' in the 18th and 19th century, leaving the skirts that left them indistinguishable from their sisters behind), and this was often recorded in a miniature portrait. Teenage girls were often painted by miniaturists as they reached a marriageable age - although as this talk will show, the relative ephemeral nature of miniatures meant they could indulge in the latest fashions which would never be allowed in an oil portrait. But there was darker side to childhood expressed in miniature too - as part of a mourning ritual for the upper classes, these tiny portraits often represented the last glimpse that parents had of their children. 

Intimate, secretive and portable, portrait miniatures reveal a reality not found in any other type of portrait.

Booking and more information here.