Mohun Double Portrait acquired by YCBA
April 14 2026
Picture: YCBA
Posted by Adam Busiakiewicz:
The Yale Center for British Art have announced their acquisition of the following double portrait of Sir Reginald Mohun and Dorothy Mohun (née Chudleigh) by an unknown artist.
According to their Facebook post:
Painted to celebrate the marriage of Sir Reginald Mohun to Dorothy Chudleigh in 1602, the painting marks the first occasion in British art that wife and husband were depicted together at full length. This innovation frees space for the newlyweds to express mutual affection through their body language, and they take the opportunity to tenderly intertwine their arms.
Moreover, the format puts the sitters’ fashionable clothes on full display. The circular pendant on Dorothy’s dress appears to be porphyry, an extremely hard stone embodying love’s endurance. The material was mined locally to the Mohuns’s home and the workshop that produced this portrait in the South of England.
Regular visitors to art fairs will have known this painting from the Weiss Gallery stand, who presumably made the sale to the YCBA (?)
Update - Confirmation has arrived that the Weiss Gallery did indeed make the sale, many congratulations to all involved!
