Mary Ethel Young Hunter

By descent through the artist's family

London, Royal Academy, 1910, no. 894;
London, Pyms Gallery, Edwardian Pre-Raphaelites, The Art of John and Mary Young Hunter, June 2000, no. 43

Royal Academy Pictures, 1910, illustrated p. 113;
Pictures of the Year, special edition of Pall Mall Magazine, 1910, illustrated p. 100

STRUCTURE This picture is in excellent original condition with strong colours and rich texture throughout. There are small areas of blooming on the pelt of the animal and on the girl's fur collar but this is only visible upon close inspection. UNDER ULTRAVIOLET LIGHT There are very minor retouchings to the red flower close to the back of the chair and a line of flecked retouching in the lower left foreground. These retouchings are not excessive or visible to the naked eye. FRAME This picture is contained in a plaster moulded frame in good condition.
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Mary Young Hunter was best-known for her portraits of child sitters and it is in this genre that she excelled. Her flamboyant style and sophisticated colour harmony are demostrated in this delightful portrait of her five year old daughter Gabrielle. The little girl appears to be playing with her mother's fur stole, wreated in her cloak and beneath a spring bonnet decorated with a large white ostrich plume. The implication is that she has been playing 'dress up' with her mother's clothes which suggests a charming interaction between the painter/mother and the daughter/sitter. The chair in which she is seated appears over-size which emphasises her petiteness as do her red-slippered toes which do not meet the ground. These slippers that give the painting its title, also give an accent of bright colour, picked up by the lacquer of the chair and the flowers on the painted screen and the cherubic lips of the girl.