Mary Walker Waugh (1868): Art, History and Details

Mary Walker Waugh (1868) is in the Cleveland Museum of Art collection. The museum's creator attribution is William Holman Hunt (British, 1827–1910).

The work and its context

The museum's open-access catalogue describes the work:

William Holman Hunt painted this portrait of Mary Walker Waugh (1805–1886)—his mother-in-law—during a time of personal tragedy. Waugh’s daughter Fanny Waugh Hunt (1832–1866), the wife of the artist, had recently died following childbirth. References to loss of life infiltrate the composition: the sitter wears black mourning attire, and behind her is a screen decorated with red poppies, a traditional symbol of unconsciousness and lifelessness because of its pharmaceutical use as a source for opiates. In Victorian society, the red poppy also signified consolation.

Object facts

• Title: Mary Walker Waugh
• Date: 1868
• Creator attribution: William Holman Hunt (British, 1827–1910)
• Culture: England, 19th century
• Type: Painting
• Technique: oil on fabric
• Dimensions: Framed: 115.5 x 95.5 x 6 cm (45 1/2 x 37 5/8 x 2 3/8 in.); Unframed: 86.2 x 66.1 cm (33 15/16 x 26 in.)
• Collection: Mod Euro - Painting 1800-1960
• Department: Modern European Painting and Sculpture
• Accession number: 1984.41

A detail from the museum

British novelist Evelyn Waugh (1903–1966) once owned this portrait, which depicts his great aunt.

Collection credit

Mr. and Mrs. William H. Marlatt Fund

Further reading listed by the museum

• "Royal Academy 101st Exhibition." The Art-Journal 8 (July 1, 1869): 197-204.
• Graves, Algernon. The Royal Academy of Arts; A Complete Dictionary of Contributors and Their Work from Its Foundation in 1769 to 1904. London, United Kingdom: H. Graves and Co, 1905.
• Rossetti, William Michael, Dante Gabriel Rossetti, and Christina Georgina Rossetti. Rossetti Papers 1862 to 1870. New York, NY: AMS Press, 1970.

View the collection record

See the museum's photographs and full catalogue entry. Catalogue text is reproduced from the Cleveland Museum of Art's open-access data, with HTML formatting removed. This object and its supplied image are designated CC0.