Hello, and welcome everyone, to another ten minute talk at the National Gallery.
My name is Clara, one of the young producers currently working here, and
today's painting of discussion is 'The Painter's Daughters Chasing a Butterfly'.
The painter in question is Thomas Gainsborough, one of the most renowned
portraiture and landscape artists of eighteenth-century England, and his two
daughters were called Mary and Margaret, who would have been around six and four
years old when this was painted in 1756. Now what's really remarkable about this
painting is the tenderness, and real emotiveness in which Gainsborough has
painted his two daughters. You really get a sense of their personality, and it's
perhaps one of the most convincing portraits of children in this gallery.
Another thing that's really remarkable about this painting is how
compositionally, both in the way in which he's paired the two sisters together, and
the use of colour, Gainsborough has suggested that his daughters resemble
and have characteristics similar to the small butterfly in the corner of the
painting. The two sisters are dressed in bright, light-coloured dresses. They're
like a beacon of light shining through the painting, and they're almost the same
colour as the butterfly. They're holding hands,
they almost seem like a single body, and researchers have suggested that in fact
each sister could be a wing of the butterfly.
Now why would Gainsborough make this connotation between the two sisters and
a butterfly? He was probably trying to reinforce their innocence, their
fragility, the fact that there are very delicate and could very easily come to
harm. The white butterfly is also generally known to be a symbol of purity
of the soul, so he's trying to make all these connotations. Perhaps he is also trying
to suggest that just like the butterfly who is fluttering away very quickly, this
moment in their childhood is also going to pass very quickly as well, just as the
children are trying to run after and catch this butterfly, he's trying to
capture a moment in their lives which will be over in a flash. Another
remarkable aspect of this painting is the individuality of the two sisters. If
you really pay attention to their features you would immediately get an
impression of what each sister is like, and it's when you're looking at these
two sisters that you begin to question whether this scene from their childhood,
where they're running around playing in a garden, is in fact as playful, as
carefree, and as joyful, as it first may seem. When you look at their expressions,
it suggests that it's probably not the case. Let's start with the younger sister,
Margaret, who is reaching out to catch the butterfly. For somebody who's being
quite impulsive and playful, I can't help but think that she looks a little bit
melancholic in her expression. She seems quite sad, perhaps she's about to burst
into tears, because she can't quite catch the butterfly. Or maybe there's something
else going on. If you actually look at the butterfly, you would see that it is
sitting on a thistle. So it's a thorny type of flower. If Margaret does manage to
catch the butterfly, she would inevitably crush it, but if she doesn't catch the
butterfly she will catch the thorny plant, and she will hurt herself. So
essentially this is a innocent child at play, who is going to come to harm. This
is a stark contrast to Mary, the older sister,
who is not impulsive like the younger one. In fact, she is holding back. Look at
the way she's holding her younger sister's hand. Her hand is on top. She is
the older, more dominant sister, and she's actively restraining the youngest
sister's impulsive urge to lunge forward. And if you look at her expression, she
also looks very very cautious, not only does she seem to anticipate what might
happen to her younger sister, she also seems to be looking beyond the canvas, as
if she's anticipating the dangers beyond, and has already, even though she's only
around one or two years older than her sister, she already seems to have gained
an understanding of the outside world and the potential dangers that it has.
She has already lost her innocence, and almost as if to reinforce this point, her
dress is yellow, it's not the pure white of her younger sister. So she's already
grown up, she's already lost a bit of her innocence, and she's already lost a part
of her childhood. Why would Gainsborough suggest these
type of emotions in each sister? Why would there be a suggestion of pathos,
sadness, and even cautiousness? Perhaps he is trying to reflect and project his own
feelings and anxieties onto his daughters. Maybe the fact that the older
sister, Mary, looks cautious and apprehensive, is the father's own
anxieties about his daughter's growing up in a potentially hostile society.
Perhaps the reason why the background is so dark: it's a suggestion that there are
dangers for these two girls growing up. They could come to harm. It's the anxiety
of a father for his two children, and maybe the fact that Mary looks
sad, and is perhaps about to burst into tears because she can't catch that butterfly,
is Gainsborough's own sadness at the realization or knowledge that this
moment in their childhood isn't going to last, and as he is painting them, that
moment is slipping away. Perhaps just as they're trying to grab
the butterfly, he is also trying to capture this moment of childhood innocence.
Iif you would like to find out more about our paintings please click
here or here, and don't forget to subscribe and comment below. Thank you
very much and see you next time.