The progressive-looking painting that isn’t what it seems

It’s a rare 17th Century example of multi-racial equality in art, but what is it really trying to say?

Newly on display at Compton Verney, an art gallery and museum in Warwickshire in the West Midlands of England, is 'Two Women Wearing Cosmetic Patches', painted c.1655.

It features two women – one black and one white – in poses, dress, jewellery, and hairstyles that largely mirror each other.

The newly conserved ‘Two Women Wearing Cosmetic Patches' (c.1655). Image courtesy of Compton Verney.

The composition is radical for its time. In 17th Century Britain it was unusual for a black person – particularly a woman – to be the focus of a painting. When they were depicted, it was mostly in subservient positions, helping show the wealth and status of a more prominent white sitter in the picture.

Indeed, it was this painting’s “great rarity” and “outstanding significance” – as judged by the Reviewing Committee on the Export of Works of Art and Objects of Cultural Interest (RCEWA) – that saw it prevented from leaving the UK following a 2021 auction.

When it was later acquired by Compton Verney in 2023, Andrew Hochhauser KC, Chair of RCEWA, said: "This anonymous mid-17th Century painting is a great rarity: it shows two women with beauty patches, one black and one white, side by side, presented as companions and equals. The painting will delight audiences and encourage debate about and research into race and gender during the period.”

What are cosmetic, or beauty, patches?

As it’s impossible to miss, the two women’s faces are decorated with circles, crescent moons, and other odd designs.

A close-up of the faces of the women in the painting, showing their beauty patches.

In a paper about patches in 17th Century paintings, Karen Hearn explains how they were part of a fashion believed to have originated in France. The patches were cut from silk, satin, or leather, to be stuck (mostly) on the face. Their purpose varied: from providing a contrast to enhance the paleness of skin, to covering scars or blemishes, and even as a homage to the Roman goddess Venus’s mole. Some also had medicinal uses, such as easing headaches.

But as with any fashion trend – equal to its adherents were its detractors.

Hearn shares that, in this period, while the great diarist Samuel Pepys noted how “My wife seemed very pretty today, it being the first time that I have given her leave to weare a black patch”, the author of The Gentlewoman’s Companion, Hannah Woolley, criticised “deform[ing] the face with black Patches, under a pretence to make it appear more beautiful”.

Woolley stated: “It is a riddle to me, that a blemish should appear a grace, a deformity be esteemed a beauty.” (She did, however, go on to inform readers about three places in London where they could buy patches “cut out into little Moons, Suns, Stars, Castles, Birds, Beasts and Fishes of allsorts”.)

What’s the painting telling us?

What the viewer might not immediately spot, is the inscription at the top of the picture.

A close-up of the inscription on the painting.

It reads:

I black with white bespott: yu white wth blacke this evill: proceeds from thy proud hart: then take her: Devill.

In an essay published on the Compton Verney website, curator Jane Simpkiss explains: “Written as if from the perspective of the Black woman, the inscription encourages the devil to drag the white woman to hell for her sins.”

This, then, is not a straightforward double portrait, but a morality painting. It condemns the women for their vanity. But more than that, it reflects the fears and anxieties around social change in 17th Century Britain – from reductions in morals to increases in immigration.

Following 18 months of conservation and research at the Yale Center for British Art, Simpkiss says: “It seems […] that the Black woman’s presence […] is supposed to suggest that the white woman’s use of cosmetic patches is not just vain, but associates her with non-European peoples and customs, ‘undermining’ her national identity. It is the equality between these two figures which the artist considers to be dangerous, rather than something to be celebrated.”

So, the artwork that appears on first glance to be progressive, is actually rather insidious.

Who painted it?

The Yale Center’s research has revealed ‘compelling evidence’ that the artist of 'Two Women Wearing Cosmetic Patches' was Father Jerome Hesketh, a priest active from 1647-1666. He travelled around Catholic houses in Lancashire performing secret masses (there were restrictions against Catholicism at the time) and may have used portrait painting as a cover.

It's believed the work was commissioned or bought around 1655 by the Kenyon family, Catholic gentry from Lancashire. It stayed in their descendants’ possession until the 2021 auction.

There are at least 13 paintings (thought to be) by Hesketh in UK public collections, but for now, this one remains by ‘an unknown artist’.

Simpkiss says: “Research is still ongoing into the painting, its historical significance and the artist who made it and there is much still to discover.”

What next?

'Two Women Wearing Cosmetic Patches' is currently hanging in the Women’s Library at Compton Verney. It’s part of a display that examines attitudes to morality and race.

Director Geraldine Collinge says: “This unusual work offers us a unique insight into societal attitudes and artistic development during one of the most tumultuous times in British history. The subject matter reveals the disturbing and widespread beliefs that shaped the perception of women and foreigners in this period, and the terrible ramifications this had on their lives.

“We look forward to sharing the work and its context and to working with artists and our broader community to explore it further.”