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This image is for study only, and may not accurately represent the object’s true color or scale…
Mrs. Billington as Saint Cecilia, after Joshua Reynolds
This image is for study only, and may not accurately represent the object’s true color or scale…
This image is for study only, and may not accurately represent the object’s true color or scale. It should not be shared or reproduced without permission by the copyright holder.

Mrs. Billington as Saint Cecilia, after Joshua Reynolds

Primary (London, England, 1769–Cheshunt, Hertfordshire, England, 1859)
NationalityEnglish, Europe
Date1803
MediumColor mezzotint
DimensionsSheet: 26 3/4 × 16 1/16 in. (68 × 40.8 cm)
Credit LineBlanton Museum of Art, The University of Texas at Austin, The Leo Steinberg Collection, 2002.1833
Collection AreaPrints and Drawings
Object number2002.1833
On View
Not on view
Label Text
Elizabeth Billington was a British opera singer famed for her vocal range as well as scandalous private life. Reynolds’s celebrated portrait (today in the Tate Gallery, London) renders her as Cecilia, the patron saint of music. The composer Haydn is said to have told Reynolds, “What have you done? You have made her listening to the angels. You should have represented the angels listening to her.”
Exhibitions