Clara Walker Allen (Mrs. William Allen, 1737-before 1765)

There are two other portraits identified as Clara Walker Allen (DIA and Shelburne Museum), but they do not all represent the same person. All three descended in the Allen family at Claremont Plantation. This is the youngest of the three subjects and is the most likely to be Clara Walker Allen, who would have been approximately twenty years old at the time Wollaston was working in Virginia. Clara Walker was the first wife of William Allen.

Dimensions: 35 7/8 x 28 5/8 in. (91.12 x 72.7 cm.)

The portrait represents a young woman in a pale gold imagined dress with a white underskirt. Her hands hold three pink roses over her stomach. A swag of red drapery appears on the subject’s right and the background is plain. She stands parallel to the picture plane.

See: Brooklyn Museum Online Collection