Information

These two studies, of the same model, are for two of the women with the back of their heads facing the viewer in Brown's painting 'Chaucer at the Court of Edward III' (1851, oil on canvas, Art Gallery of New South Wales, Sydney). The pose on the left matches that of the the woman on the far left of the painting talking to her friend. In the final version she wears a medieval headdress and her hair is in draped plaits. The second pose on the right is most likely for that of the woman sitting in the centre of the painting, in front of the fountain, and holding a rose. In the final version her head is tilted to the left and she wears a headdress which Brown sourced from a popular nineteenth costume book Joseph Strutt's 'A Complete View of the Dress and Habits of the People of England' (pub.1796-9).LM

  • Purchased and presented by subscribers, 1906.
  • © Birmingham Museums and Art Gallery

Makers

Association Artist Organisation
Artist Ford Madox Brown -

Inscriptions

Type Position(s) Method Date(s) Notes
Ford M Brown London/47
Signature and date bottom right Handwritten 1847 Brown ink.
 

Literature

Author(s) Date(s) Publisher Pages
City of Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery: Catalogue of the Permanent Collection of Drawings
A E Whitley 1939 Bemrose & Sons Ltd, Derby p. 34
 
Ford Madox Brown: The Unofficial Pre-Raphaelite
Laura MacCulloch, Tessa Sidey 2008 D. Giles Limited, London p. 65

Associated people

Name Type
Geoffrey Chaucer Associated with
King Edward III Associated with

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