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Lot Essay
Marianne's religious pictures date from 1890. As a devout Catholic, she was interested in creating small altarpieces for private devotion, often seeking out antique frames on her extensive travels around Europe with her husband Adrian. A favourite subject in Old Master painting, it was uncommon for a modern artist to depict the cousin of the infant Christ, let alone present the viewer with the sacrificial lamb - a presage of their future roles as protectors of the flock.
The miniature habit the infant Saint wears indicates the artist's interest in Franciscan subject matter: she soon after painted a portrait of four boys with lilies entitled Franciscan Scholars, shown at the New Gallery in 1902. The subjects have limpid eyes, and share the same solemn expressions, their hair close-cut, though not yet tonsured; the flat opaque gold differs from her usual translucent halos (see Hail Mary, 1891, and Angels entertaining the Holy child, 1893), instead emulating the type in St Elizabeth of Hungary shown at the New Gallery in 1895. The same halo type re-emerges in Madonna and child with symbols from a litany (1905), its Spanish frame being sufficiently intricate to hold candles as well as declaring 'Ave Maria'.
Marianne belonged to the group of English artists of the tempera revival and she perfected her technique of employing a fine plaster ground (gesso grosso) with intense study and practice: most of her paintings in the important Fine Art Society show share this surface. The plain, barren, desert background is a stark contrast to her often luscious imaginative landscapes, particularly those she employed for her mythological work.
The frame, designed to be free standing therefore particularly suitable for a working altar, is of an aedicular or tabernacle style Florentine type, whose popularity spread throughout Northern Italy and beyond.
We are grateful to Magdalen Evans for preparing this catalogue entry.
The miniature habit the infant Saint wears indicates the artist's interest in Franciscan subject matter: she soon after painted a portrait of four boys with lilies entitled Franciscan Scholars, shown at the New Gallery in 1902. The subjects have limpid eyes, and share the same solemn expressions, their hair close-cut, though not yet tonsured; the flat opaque gold differs from her usual translucent halos (see Hail Mary, 1891, and Angels entertaining the Holy child, 1893), instead emulating the type in St Elizabeth of Hungary shown at the New Gallery in 1895. The same halo type re-emerges in Madonna and child with symbols from a litany (1905), its Spanish frame being sufficiently intricate to hold candles as well as declaring 'Ave Maria'.
Marianne belonged to the group of English artists of the tempera revival and she perfected her technique of employing a fine plaster ground (gesso grosso) with intense study and practice: most of her paintings in the important Fine Art Society show share this surface. The plain, barren, desert background is a stark contrast to her often luscious imaginative landscapes, particularly those she employed for her mythological work.
The frame, designed to be free standing therefore particularly suitable for a working altar, is of an aedicular or tabernacle style Florentine type, whose popularity spread throughout Northern Italy and beyond.
We are grateful to Magdalen Evans for preparing this catalogue entry.