Portrait of Lorna Marsali Woodroffe-Lang, born Forbes-Leith

In 1913 Lady Forbes-Leith of Fyvie commissioned this portrait of her granddaughter, Lorna Marsali Forbes-Leith, from the society painter Philip de László. It was the intention of Lady Forbes-Leith that the portrait would hang at the family home of Fyvie Castle, located in northeast Scotland.

Hungarian-born artist de László made his name as a portrait painter at the Austro-Hungarian court. In 1907 de László moved to London, where he became one of the most fashionable painters of the age, undertaking portraits of the British royal family as well as members of the aristocracy.

De László’s portrait of Lorna shows her in a cream summer dress holding onto a large hat on her head. Just after the picture was completed in 1916, Lorna eloped with Captain Conyers Frederick Woodroffe Lang, against the advice of her family. The estrangement meant that the portrait did not hang at Fyvie Castle.

Lorna divorced Lang in 1933 and married Colonel George Prior. She died in 1975, and the portrait passed by descent to her granddaughter. It joins the collection at Fyvie Castle, owned by the National Trust for Scotland, where – as originally intended – it now complements a collection that includes de László’s portraits of Lorna’s brother and father.