There are many paintings that most people would instantly recognise, even if they didn't know the painter's name. Da Vinci's Mona Lisa, Van Gogh's Sunflowers, Botticelli's Birth of Venus, and this painting by William Frederick Yeames.
I've always liked the idea of 'story telling' in painting. A vase of flowers is all well and good, but this picture tells a story that never fails to fascinate.
Yeames's 1878 painting 'And when did you last see your father' is a classic. The small boy has been brought before a group of interrogating Parliamentarians, who are asking him about the whereabouts of his Royalist father. The boy's sister is next in line for questioning.
Yeames was born in Russia in 1835, and died in Devon UK in 1918. I believe he based the boy in the painting on Gainsborough's 'Blue Boy', who is similarly dressed.
If you wish to see the painting, you need to visit The Walker in Liverpool.
Of course I was already familiar with the painting but I did not know the name of the artist. He had a big bushy beard. Perhaps he made paint brushes from it.
ReplyDeleteThe bushy beard was a style favoured by many painters of that time. Unless they were sable coloured, they wouldn't have made very good brushes.
DeleteAgree, paintings tell stories. Even a vase of sunflowers does. It's all in the eye of the beholder and their imagination.
ReplyDeleteThe title of the above made me smile. My father is, on the whole - except when it suits him otherwise - a man of outstanding moral principles. HA! I must have been about ten. The phone rings. My father instructs me to pick up the phone and LIE. No shit. So I talk to caller and deny all knowledge of my father's whereabouts. No, he is isn't at home and, no, I don't know when he'll return. Not quite sure what I realized that moment [about adults]. Let's just say I was confused, bemused. So, yes, I feel for both the boy and his sister in the above scenario. I sincerely hope they REALLY didn't know where their dad was; it's one thing to tell a lie on the phone; face to face not so easy [for a kid] without blushing - giving the game away.
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If indeed the story is based on an actual event, I'm sure neither children would have known their father's whereabouts.
DeleteThat wouldn't be a problem nowadays would it? It would be "hang on I'll just What's App him" or check on GPS"!
ReplyDeleteI like the picture, which makes you wonder if the children would be threatened or even tortured.
I do hope not. The interrogators don't look too aggressive.
DeleteNot being into art and other cultures, I have never seen that painting.
ReplyDeleteIt's well known over here. A classic.
DeleteI grew up with a giant volume of very nice prints of classic art and spent hours as a child, looking at the pictures, trying to figure out the stories in them. This one was quite possibly the one I spent the most time on.
ReplyDeleteThank you for reminding me of that.