Frick Announces Promised Gift of Gainsborough Portrait
New York (February 10, 2026) — The Frick Collection today announced the promised gift of Thomas Gainsborough’s Mrs. Alexander Champion (1767 and ca. 1775) from one of its Trustees. The painting will be shown in the museum’s permanent collection galleries beginning February 11 and will remain on view throughout the run of the Frick’s special exhibition Gainsborough: The Fashion of Portraiture, which opens to the public on February 12. The gift will be displayed separately from the exhibition, in the Library Gallery.
Remarked Axel Rüger, Anna-Maria and Stephen Kellen Director, “Coinciding fittingly with our new special exhibition on the artist, this promised gift is the first work by Thomas Gainsborough slated to enter our collection in eighty years. We are thrilled to display Mrs. Alexander Champion in the context of the Frick’s holdings—particularly our renowned English portraits, including an important group of paintings by Gainsborough. The work is the latest in a number of promised gifts we have celebrated in recent years, part of the museum’s ongoing acquisitions program, which judiciously augments and complements our permanent collection.”
Added Aimee Ng, the Frick’s newly appointed Peter Jay Sharp Chief Curator, “Gainsborough was one of the most fashionable society painters of his age and also a favorite of Henry Clay Frick, who acquired eight works by the artist during his lifetime. Mrs. Alexander Champion introduces a facet of Gainsborough’s career not yet represented in the Frick’s holdings: his female bust portraits of the mid-1770s, made at the very height of his fashion, when he moved to London to take on a greater role in the art world. We are so excited to be able to display this promised gift on the occasion of our Gainsborough exhibition, the first ever devoted to the artist at the Frick.”
ABOUT THE ARTIST AND SITTER
One of the leading artists of eighteenth-century Britain, Thomas Gainsborough was an accomplished painter of landscapes but made his fame and livelihood as one of the most sought-after society portraitists of the eighteenth century. A native of Sudbury, Suffolk, he rose to prominence in the fashionable spa town of Bath, where he and his family moved in 1759. As Gainsborough’s reputation grew, he moved to London in 1774 and became, with Sir Joshua Reynolds, one of the capital’s preeminent painters. Gainsborough attained royal patronage in 1781, painting for King George III, Queen Charlotte, and their family.
The sitter depicted in this new acquisition is Frances, Mrs. Alexander Champion (née Nind, 1740–1818). Frances spent much of her early life in India, then under British rule, and in 1759 married Colonel Thomas Alexander Champion in Calcutta, where he was stationed as Commander-in-Chief of the Bengal Army. She amassed a collection of Indian works of art, including coins, miniatures, and ivory boxes, some of which remains in the collection at Hatchlands Park, Surrey. The couple returned permanently to England after Colonel Champion’s retirement around 1775, moving into a fashionable address in Bath, where Frances’s Wednesday evening parties were said to have been a coveted social invitation.
The portrait was probably painted first in Bath around 1767, when the Champions traveled from India to England for a visit. Gainsborough painted Frances in the fashion of the mid-1760s, with a low, round hairstyle; a sacque dress with a pleated train at the back; lace engageantes, or false sleeves; a lace stomacher; and a thick choker. After the Champions returned to England, in 1775, Gainsborough augmented the portrait with fashions of the mid-1770s: He painted over her hair to raise it into a high, powdered pouf, removed the choker, and covered her sacque dress with a classically inspired wrapping gown, featuring gold fringe, drop pearls, and a sash tied at the waist. The brushwork comprising her new outfit exemplifies the swift, illusionistic style for which Gainsborough would become famous in London.
GAINSBOROUGH HOLDINGS AT THE FRICK
The museum’s founder, Henry Clay Frick, like many American collectors of the Gilded Age, favored Thomas Gainsborough as one of the leading painters of the British school.
Between 1903 and 1917, Frick acquired eight works by the artist: five paintings (Mrs. Charles Hatchett; The Hon. Frances Duncombe; Sarah Hodges, Later Lady Innes; The Mall in St. James’s Park; and Mrs. Peter William Baker), two portrait sketches (Study of a Woman Facing Left, Possibly Ann Ford, Later Mrs. Philip Thicknesse and Study of a Woman Facing Right, Possibly Ann Ford, Later Mrs. Philip Thicknesse), and one chalk-and-oil sheet (Landscape with Cattle Crossing a Bridge).
In 1946, almost three decades after Frick’s death, the museum acquired two additional bust portraits by the artist (Grace Dalrymple Elliott and Richard Paul Jodrell).
ABOUT THE FRICK COLLECTION
Housed in one of New York City’s last great Gilded Age homes, The Frick Collection provides intimate encounters with one of the world’s foremost collections of fine and decorative arts. Open since 1935, the institution originated with Henry Clay Frick, who bequeathed his Fifth Avenue residence and collection of European paintings, sculpture, and decorative arts for the enjoyment of the public. The museum’s holdings, which encompass masterworks from the Renaissance through the late nineteenth century, have grown over the decades, more than doubling in number since the opening of the museum. The Frick Art Research Library, founded more than one hundred years ago by Henry Clay Frick’s daughter Helen Clay Frick, is today a leading art history research center that serves students, scholars, and the public.
Last spring, the Frick completed a major renovation and enhancement project and reopened on April 17, 2025, with great fanfare. Designed by Selldorf Architects, with executive architect Beyer Blinder Belle, the project was developed to honor the historic legacy and character of the Frick while addressing critical infrastructural and operational needs.
For more information, please visit frick.org.