The Young Mother. "Lo! at the couch where infant beauty sleeps, etc." - Campbell, 'Pleasures of Hope'

Details

Benjamin Williams Leader, R.A. (1831-1923)
The Young Mother. "Lo! at the couch where infant beauty sleeps, etc." - Campbell, 'Pleasures of Hope'
signed and dated 'B.W. Leader. 1856.' (lower left) and further signed, inscribed and numbered 'No 1 The young mother./B Leader./Diglis House. Worcester.' (on the artist's label attached to the reverse)
oil on canvas
18 x 24 in. (45.7 x 61 cm.)

Provenance

with Richard Green, London.

Literature

Art Journal, Christmas 1901, pp. 13, 16.
F. Lewis, Benjamin Williams Leader, R.A. 1831-1923, Leigh-on-Sea, 1971, pp. 28, 31, no. 6.
R. Wood, Benjamin Williams Leader: His Life and Paintings, Woodbridge, 1998, pp. 18-19, 80, 128, pl. 4.

Exhibited

London, Royal Academy, 1856, no. 718.
Worcester, Society of Arts, 1856, no. 205.
London, French Gallery, Winter Exhibition, 1890.

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Clare Keiller

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Lot Essay

In the Christmas edition of the Art Journal of 1901 the critic Lewis Lusk commented on this painting: 'Evidently the painter is influenced by the Pre-Raphaelite style of Millais. Every fold of the dress, every vein of the woodwork, almost every eyelash of the handsome woman and her pretty child, is drawn with exquisite care. Observe the choice patchwork quilt, so typical of old Warwickshire, and the fine modelling of each face. The whole is as perfect as the work of an old Dutch painter'.

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