Sarah King

Gottfried Lindauer was born in 1839 in Plzeň, Bohemia, then part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. In 1855, he travelled to Vienna, where he studied painting for several years. He worked for a time in the studio of Carl Hemerlein, a portrait painter, before returning to Plzeň, where he establishing his own studio in 1864. In 1874, he immigrated to New Zealand.

Lindauer is today best-known for his portraits of Māori people and his paintings showing ‘scenes from Māori life’. In his day, however, he achieved considerable success as a painter of portraits of Pākehā. He produced a good number of pendant portraits showing couples of status and means. This painting and its partner, James Polyblank King, are fine examples of the type.

The work is believed to depict Sarah King (c. 1826–1896). Born in England, she married James Polyblank King in Montreal in 1853.[1] She gave birth to sons in 1856 and 1858, and the family immigrated to New Zealand in 1862. A third son was born in 1867.[2] Little else is presently known about her life.

Sarah King died on 26 September 1895, aged 70, and was buried at Purewa Cemetery.

[1] ‘James Polyblank King’, Find a Grave, accessed 11 April 2025, https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/160309325/james_polyblank-king.

[2] ‘Births’, New Zealand Herald, 1 June 1867, 4. https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/newspapers/NZH18670601.2.10.1.