11th Sep, 2012 10:00
Fine Art
Sold for £2,800
Lot details
J*** Fisher (19th Century) ''MOLLY BAWN SEATED AT HER SPINNING WHEEL'' with inscription on the slip oil on canvas 104.5 x 130.5cms; 41 1/4 x 51 1/4in. NB Molly Bawn (1878) is the best-known novel by Irish novelist Margaret Wolfe Hungerford, nee Hamilton (1855-1897). It is the story of a frivolous and flirtatious Irish girl who arouses her lovers' jealousy and naively ignores social conventions. There is a reference to the novel in chapter 18 of James Joyce's Ulysses. Molly Bawn contains the first use of the famous idiom ''Beauty is in the eye of the beholder''. The style of this painting suggests perhaps a date earlier than 1878 and the title suggested by the inscription on the frame may be retrospective. The identity of the artist too is problematic but may perhaps be Joshua Fisher (b.1859) a pupil of John Finnie (1829-1907) at the Liverpool School of Art. See illustration
J*** Fisher (19th Century) ''MOLLY BAWN SEATED AT HER SPINNING WHEEL'' with inscription on the slip oil on canvas 104.5 x 130.5cms; 41 1/4 x 51 1/4in. NB Molly Bawn (1878) is the best-known novel by Irish novelist Margaret Wolfe Hungerford, nee Hamilton (1855-1897). It is the story of a frivolous and flirtatious Irish girl who arouses her lovers' jealousy and naively ignores social conventions. There is a reference to the novel in chapter 18 of James Joyce's Ulysses. Molly Bawn contains the first use of the famous idiom ''Beauty is in the eye of the beholder''. The style of this painting suggests perhaps a date earlier than 1878 and the title suggested by the inscription on the frame may be retrospective. The identity of the artist too is problematic but may perhaps be Joshua Fisher (b.1859) a pupil of John Finnie (1829-1907) at the Liverpool School of Art. See illustration
Auction: Fine Art, 11th Sep, 2012
