The New Bronte Portrait ? by Abigail Bell
There is a debate raging at present about this lovely portrait of three young ladies owned by Mr J Von Grosny. It is suggested that this is a new Bronte portrait, painted by Landseer in1838. (It has recently been confirmed as by Landseer)

The details of this debate can be followed on several blogs

http://bronteblog.blogspot.com/2009/08/new-bronte-portrait.html

http://soeursbronte.wordpress.com/2011/02/17/les-bronte-par-edwin-landseer-un-portrait-controverse/

http://bookstains.wordpress.com/2011/03/16/did-the-real-charlotte-bronte-just-stand-up-the-debate/

The date is arrived at from a note on the painting and from extensive and detailed background research by the portraits owner. I have my doubts on the date. I would really like this to be a new Bronte portrait, it's graceful and light compared to the rather sombre portraits by Branwell and this is also a much clearer and more detailed study. While I don’t know enough about the Brontes movements in that year to comment on it historically, I am open-minded about the painting being of the sisters. I am pretty certain it could not be a painting of the Bronte sisters in 1838, this is purely due to internal evidence. The clothing worn by the young ladies in the portrait is completely wrong, all extant clothing dating from around 1838 is very different.
Picture
By Landseer
It is all but impossible for the sitters, if they were the Brontes, to be wearing the gowns in the portrait. In 1838 it would be the equivalent of being dressed in the Dior new look style in Haworth in 1946, not impossible but extremely unlikely (the Dior New Look collection only came out in 1947). The dresses in the painting pose exactly this problem as there was quite a radical change of style at the end of the 1830's from the romantic era gowns to what we perceive as the typically Victorian look seen below (image from the V and A collection). The gown on the right is from the 1840's.
It is possible to find images showing similar gowns to those in the painting from 1838. This is a fashion plate and at first glance the gowns seem similar, however they are in many respects very different. The shoulders are much lower on these gowns than on the portrait gowns with a wide necked look that’s at odds with later higher necked 1840's fashions. Sleeves also tend to be set lower and be much fuller and more complex. Almost every extant late 1830's dress I have seen has smocking or similar complex sleeve treatments .
In addition most clothes worn in  portraits dated from 1838 do not resemble the mystery girls portrait. These are portraits of rich and fashionable ladies who would be dressed in the current fashions. As a comparison here is a portrait of the young queen victoria dated 1838. Notice the wide white linen/lace collar full sleeves and drooping shoulder line. A further portrait exhibited at the Royal academy in 1838 also shows the lower set sleeves and wider shoulder line. The waist line is also higher and lacks the pointed front.
Dresses with pointed waists do occur in the late 1830's, this dress is loosely dated 1836 to 1840 and is from the V and A collection, note however the smocked and full sleeves and the wide neckline, usually covered by a wide white-collar or shawl.
The main source of images to back up the 1838 dating are sketches and fashion plates which are the Victorian equivalent of today's glossy fashion magazines. The route from fashion plate to actual gowns on ladies would have a time lag that varied according to circumstances, the rich in fashionable London society may well have had the gowns within a month or perhaps less. The less wealthy and middle classes would have to wait much longer. They would first have to have access to a sketch of the new styles either in a ladies magazine or seen in a shop window. Very few ladies magazines existed (the Englishwoman domestic magazine was the most famous and did have sketches and patterns but was only founded in 1852 and I believe it was roughly at that time that paper patterns were produced en mass). I don’t recall anything approaching fashion magazines in the Brontes lists of reading matter. Next they would need to be able to find the money to buy fabric and trims boning etc, a major expense since these dresses take a lot of fabric, between at the very least  5 and 7 yards of 45 inch wide fabric (My green dress took well over 5 yards of 52 in wide fabric including its pelerine,a three tiered 1850s dress takes over 10 yards and one of the portrait dresses  appears to be at least 2 tiered ). This is at a time when Patrick still insisted they wore silk or wool or at least mixes so that would further increase the cost, silk was around 3 shillings a yard. For each of the Bronte sisters to make a new dress would be a major expense when the Brontes were not earning money and when clothing cost a much larger percentage of income than now. It is probable that if they were making dresses at this time the dresses would be simple ones in dark muted colours, black, v dark grey etc as would befit governesses or teachers. It would be very bad for a governess to be dressed in the most up to date styles and light colours. In this painting the governess is sown in a plain black gown while the young lady wears one similar to the portrait gowns.
In addition unless they were supremely skilled professional seamstresses they would need a pattern or something more detailed than a sketch in a window to work from as the dresses are complicated. Fabrics and trims would need to be sent for or bought. It would then take at least two weeks, probably much longer to make up the dress. I sew all my outfits by hand and a dress like those in the portrait would take me at the very least two weeks, that is by spending more or less all day long sewing for 6 or 7 days a week and I don’t worry too much about how big my stitches are on the hems and seams and neither do I  usually line skirts or sleeves. The  Victorians expected neat tiny stitches which take much longer and most Victorian clothing is lined. The Brontes didn’t have leisure to spend all their days making new dresses so I would imagine that for the sisters it would be a months work to make a new dress. The only dress dated roughly equivalent to this time in the Bronte collection is very different to the portrait gowns and shows the typical high waist, wide neckline and complicated sleeve treatment of the 1830s.

Emily until well after her trip to Brussels in 1842 continued wearing the now outdated Gigot sleeves, a fact attested to by every contemporary biographer from sources that had actually been in contact with the sisters during their lives. This is a very distinct style to the neat little gowns in the painting and easily identified.
I have been researching the Brontes clothing for a work related project and in the process I have made a very detailed search of the Bronte online archives and read as closely as possible any of Charlotte’s correspondence that mentions clothing. I have also read contemporary biographies such as Mrs Gaskell’s, Mrs Robinson’s and Francis Leyland. All these agree that Emily did not wear the portrait girls kind of dress in 1838 and most suggest she wore some form of Gigot sleeve well into the 1840s. In additon it's possible that the sisters were still wearing their hair in the “unbecoming frizz” that is often mentioned.

I will be doing a very detailed post presently on my Bronte clothing research with details of fabrics and gowns both in the museum collections and recorded in letters or biographies for anyone wanting to take a more in-depth look at the subject.

I do wish the owner of the portrait well in his search for evidence for a clear and irrefutable Bronte link but I think the date will need to be re thought to include a later date for the image or at least for its completion. I want to be clear that this is not a judgement of the painting's authenticity only its dating.

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