The Victorian Sisters

Details

Gwen John (1876-1939)
The Victorian Sisters
with stamped signature 'Gwen John' (lower left), annotated with colour notes (on the reverse)
pencil, watercolour and bodycolour
6 3/8 x 4¾ in. (16.2 x 12 cm.)
Executed circa 1928-1933.

Provenance

The Estate of the Artist.
with Davis & Langdale, New York (DLA 1235), where purchased by the present owner in 1988.

Literature

Exhibition catalogue, Gwen John (1876-1939) Drawings and Watercolours, New York, Davis & Langdale, 1981, no. 40, illustrated.

Exhibited

New York, Davis & Langdale, Gwen John (1876-1939) Drawings and Watercolours, April - May 1981, no. 40.
New York, Davis & Langdale, Gwen John (1876-1939), February 1988, no. 39.

Special notice

VAT rate of 5% is payable on hammer price and at 15% on the buyer's premium

Lot Essay

The present work is based on a prayer card of 1926 which depicts an 1878 photograph of Ste Thérèse de Lisieux at the age of three and a half with another child, presumably her older sister. On the prayer card is a letter from the saint's mother to another daughter, Pauline, 'La pauvre petite avait peur du photographe; elle qui sourit tourjours faisait la lippe comme lorsque less larmes sont preés de venir, il a fallu la rassurer'. Gwen executed many sketches of the composition between 1928 and 1933.

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