Rackham, Arthur

320 by 520mm., unfinished pencil and ink drawing, signed and dated lower left "Arthur Rackham 1900", some corrections in gouache

A finished colour drawing was published in the 1901 Christmas Number of Black and White. According to Riall this was also published in Only My Fun in 1910 with the title "The Big Family of Merry, Merry People Who Have Made Us All Happy". The cause for abandoning the present piece is unknown, but demonstrates the artist's working method. The composition is especially significant for showing Rackham's depiction of characters from Alice's Adventures in Wonderland seven years before his own edition of that work.