Girl in a Blue Dress
The pair appear here in the guise of hugely popular writer Alfred Gibson and his wife Dorothea.
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Alfred, symbol of the Victorian age, the self-styled One and Only, is to be buried, his last work unfinished, to a deafening chorus of national mourning. Ten years earlier, with tactical cruelty, he had ousted Dorothea - passive, eternally with child - from their home to indulge his infatuation with a young actress, Wilhemina Ricketts.
‘Girl in a Blue Dress’, Philip Wilson Steer, c | Tate
With Dorothea's sister, Sissy, ensconced as housekeeper and surrogate mother, the docile "Dodo" the abbreviation implies extinction is dispatched to a dingy basement with no company save a wheezing dog and a servant. Her occasional visitors include wilful Kitty, the Gibsons' eldest, and Kitty's ineffectual husband Augustus, constantly pursued by creditors.
Contact with Alfred and with Dorothea's other children has been abruptly severed. The story opens on the day of Gibson's funeral at Westminster Abbey. Uninvited, Dorothea reflects on their 20 years together before the humiliating separation.
Sentimental early recollections of the determined, witty young clerk's importunate wooing of the fair-haired "girl in a blue dress", her prosperous parents' disapproval, and their whirlwind wedding are coupled with admiration and resentment at Alfred's prodigious work ethic and overwhelming ambition.
Most unnerving for the bride is Alfred's interest in Alice, Dorothea's teenage sister, who moves in with them at Alfred's insistence. Alfred treats the girl with a playful yet intense regard. When she suddenly dies, his grief is manifested in an astonishing, disabling manner. The sitter in this painting bears a close resemblance in both dress and appearance to Miss Rose Pettigrew, whose portrait Steer painted in repr.
Girl in a Blue Dress Holding a Piece of Sewing
It seems not unreasonable to suppose that N is of about the same date as this. Main menu additional Become a Member Shop. Artist Philip Wilson Steer — Medium Oil paint on wood. Acquisition Bequeathed by Sir Hugh Walpole Display caption Catalogue entry.
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This girl admiring the pages of a picture book is Rose Pettigrew, who modelled for Steer for eight years. British impressionism New English Art Club. Explore people 35, actions: You might like Left Right.
