Violet was one of the first exhibitors of both drawings and sculptures at Sir Coutts's new Grosvenor Gallery (opened by him in 1877), and continued to exhibit extensively her whole life at all the major British galleries (including the Fine Art Society, the Royal Academy, and the New Gallery) as well as in France and the United States. She also published a selection of her portraits, in 1900, as "Portraits of Men and Women".
Despite praise, she suffered because of her rank, bringing accusations of dilettantism. She was one of the central figures of the Souls, the group of aristocrats which formed in the 1870s-1890s. Many of them produced portraits of Violet, including GF Watts and JJ Shannon, and she was regarded as their most talented practical artist and the greatest beauty. Mrs Patrick Campbell once described her as ‘the most beautiful thing I ever saw’. However, she also pushed the borders of what was acceptably bohemian by making some of her closest friendships with actors such as Sir Herbert Beerbohm Tree and his wife and three daughters, encouraging her own daughters to take walk-on parts in his productions.
Violet converted 16 Arlington Street into a hospital for the duration of the First World War, selling it on her husband's death in 1925 and moving to 34 Chapel Street, Belgrave Square, London. There she continued to work, exhibiting up until November 1937. |
