SlideShare a Scribd company logo
1 of 40
Download to read offline
Evelyn Pickering de Morgan
http://www.artmagick.com/pictures/artist.aspx?artist=evelyn-pickering-de-morgan Mary Evelyn De Morgan, née Pickering, was a late-Victorian artist who lived and worked in a period marked by cataclysmic changes. Born mid-century in an England ruled over by Queen Victoria, she lived to see a series of changes climaxing in 1914 with the collapse of established world order. It was amidst this atmosphere of increasing uncertainty and anxiety that De Morgan came to maturity and developed her personal and artistic philosophies. Throughout her career as a painter, she used literary allusion and allegory to express her strongly held views on contemporary spiritual, social and moral issues.
Despite initial parental disapproval of her chosen career, Evelyn was a privileged woman. She enjoyed an upper-class lifestyle in London; excellent home education; instruction at the South Kensington National Art Training School (1872) and at the Slade School of Art (1873-76) under Edward J. Poynter. She had the artistic as well as moral support of her uncle, the Pre-Raphaelite painter John Roddam Spencer Stanhope (1829-1908). These advantages, when combined with Evelyn’s prodigious talent and early decision to devote her life to art, moulded a temperament that was confident and not easily deterred by obstacles such as familial apathy, the condescension of male artists and critics, and lack of robust patronage.
In the early 1880s, Evelyn moved her studio from her family home in Bryanston Square to the popular Trafalgar Studios in Manresa Road, Chelsea. During this period, she lived as a professional artist in London with periodic trips to Italy where she would absorb the influences of the early Italian masters. While it is likely that she spent much of this period of her life perfecting her craft, she also took an active part in the artistic/social scene of the day. With friends such as Violet Paget, Emily Susan Ford, Margaret Burne-Jones and Mary De Morgan, she attended the theatre, Royal Academy openings and art studio open-house events.
Some time during the mid 1880s she met the ceramic designer William De Morgan (1839-1917) and his family. This introduction to the bohemian and intellectual De Morgan family was clearly a turning point in her life. Her future mother-in-law, the spiritualist and social activist Sophia Frend De Morgan (1809-1892) became her informal mentor, helping to further develop the younger woman’s interest in spiritualist practices and in social reform.   In 1887 Evelyn married William De Morgan. Despite the age difference theirs was a harmonious and mutually supportive marriage. In addition to their artistic pursuits, they shared a well-documented sense of humour and an idealistic spirit.
Their mutual interests included social reform, spiritualism and music. Evelyn provided financial and moral support for her husband’s pottery business, which though successful required much capital.   From the early 1890s, in the interest of William’s health, Evelyn enthusiastically accompanied him on extended stays to Florence every winter. As fellow artists, they led an idyllic life in Italy: Evelyn created her pictures, while William worked on his ceramic designs with the Italian painters he had hired. The De Morgans spent their weekends in the hills above Florence, at the sumptuous Bellosguardo villa where Spencer Stanhope had made his permanent home.
During her lifetime Evelyn De Morgan produced approximately 102 oil paintings and over 300 drawings. At first glance, works like  Flora  (1894),  Cadmus and Harmonia  (1877),  Eos  (1895) and  Night and Sleep  (1878) appear to be that of a typical mid-century literary painter influenced by the work of Spencer Stanhope, Watts and Burne-Jones. Consequently, this was the way in which most contemporary critics assessed her paintings: Many do reflect the usual conventions and literary subjects of late Victorian art with its Pre-Raphaelite traces and neo-classical tendencies. However, looking closer, one discovers Symbolist works that employ the language of Christian allegory to reveal the artist’s engagement with the contemporary issues of her time.
Because of the nexus between spiritualism and feminism during the late Victorian era, Evelyn, like her fellow female artists, sought new heroines with which to construct her own images of Victorian womanhood. Hence, she painted portraits of strong-minded biblical and classical women such as Ruth and Naomi, the Virgin Mary, Medea, Ariadne, Cassandra and Helen of Troy. In addition to these portrayals, Evelyn sought a new heroic female type, which could embody spiritual empowerment. For Evelyn, who had struggled to overcome the limitations of gender and class to find fulfillment, the figure of the female martyr seems to have become a particularly apt symbol of feminine spiritual power and social responsibility .
These works may be divided into three categories: spiritualist allegories, depictions of sacred heroines, and war paintings.   In 1914, as war approached, Evelyn and William De Morgan left Italy for the last time and returned to Chelsea to live and work. The Great War of 1914-1918 unnerved both these idealists, whose lives had been devoted to art and beauty. Despite her horror of war, Evelyn did not shrink from recording her response. Again she used the language of Christian allegory to paint pictures representing violence, pain, loss and, finally, redemption .
William De Morgan died, probably of influenza, in 1917. Evelyn lived on until 1919, painting and attending to William’s artistic legacy. She lived to see the end of the war, but not the signing of the Treaty of Versailles.   In 1916, her last exhibition was held at her Chelsea studio. It included works such as  S.O.S  (s.d.),  1914  (1914),  The Field of the Slain  (s.d.) and  The Red Cross  (s.d.) and was organized for the benefit of the British and Italian Red Cross.
An Angel pipping to the Souls in Hell
Aurora Triumphans
Boreas and Oreithya Cadmus and Harmonia
Cassandra Clytie
Dejanera Eos
Earthbound
Flora Gloria in Excelsis
Helen of Troy Hero holding the  beacon for Lender
Hope in the Prison of Despair
Love’s Passing
Our Lady of Peace Luna
Lux in Tenebris   Medeea
Mercury Phosphorus and Hesperis
Night and Sleep
Port after Stormy Seas--Spencer’s Faerie Queene
Queen Eleanor and Fair Rosamund
SOS The Dryad
The Angel of Death The Crown of Glory
The Cadence of Autumn
The Captives
The Field of the Slain
The Gilded Cage
The Hour Glass The Love Potion
The Prisoner
Tobias and the Angel The Red Cross (Allegory of Flander War Graves)
The Sea Maidens
The Storm Spirit
The Valley of Shadows
The Vision
The Worship  of Mammon

More Related Content

What's hot

Caravaggio - Genius and Rebel 4
Caravaggio - Genius and Rebel 4Caravaggio - Genius and Rebel 4
Caravaggio - Genius and Rebel 4Jerry Daperro
 
Tate Britain, London 1.0
Tate Britain, London 1.0Tate Britain, London 1.0
Tate Britain, London 1.0Jerry Daperro
 
Lady of Shalott
Lady of ShalottLady of Shalott
Lady of ShalottLidiaGon
 
Joaquin Sorolla - Master of Light 1.0
Joaquin Sorolla - Master of Light  1.0Joaquin Sorolla - Master of Light  1.0
Joaquin Sorolla - Master of Light 1.0Jerry Daperro
 
Victorianism, Melinda K. Toribiio
Victorianism, Melinda K. ToribiioVictorianism, Melinda K. Toribiio
Victorianism, Melinda K. ToribiioMary Castagna
 
Shakespeare by Aphrodite and Georgia
Shakespeare by Aphrodite and GeorgiaShakespeare by Aphrodite and Georgia
Shakespeare by Aphrodite and Georgianan_di
 
Dulwich Picture Gallery 1.0
Dulwich Picture Gallery 1.0Dulwich Picture Gallery 1.0
Dulwich Picture Gallery 1.0Jerry Daperro
 
RESIDE_Simon_Toll
RESIDE_Simon_TollRESIDE_Simon_Toll
RESIDE_Simon_TollPaula Story
 
Properzia De’ Rossi
Properzia De’ RossiProperzia De’ Rossi
Properzia De’ Rossincarrigan71
 
The English art in the 19th century
The English art in the 19th century  The English art in the 19th century
The English art in the 19th century BapeBubble
 
Pinacoteca di brera milan 1.0
Pinacoteca di brera milan 1.0Pinacoteca di brera milan 1.0
Pinacoteca di brera milan 1.0Jerry Daperro
 
Shakespeare by Vasiliki and Micaela
Shakespeare by Vasiliki and MicaelaShakespeare by Vasiliki and Micaela
Shakespeare by Vasiliki and Micaelanan_di
 
Sorolla por Ally
Sorolla por AllySorolla por Ally
Sorolla por AllyNoeliaRG
 
Shakespeare by Jenny and Jim
Shakespeare by Jenny and JimShakespeare by Jenny and Jim
Shakespeare by Jenny and Jimnan_di
 
Shakespeare by Nick Ch. and Kostas
Shakespeare by Nick Ch. and KostasShakespeare by Nick Ch. and Kostas
Shakespeare by Nick Ch. and Kostasnan_di
 
Pattern: A Universal Language in Art (slide lecture by Glenn Hirsch)
Pattern: A Universal Language in Art (slide lecture by Glenn Hirsch)Pattern: A Universal Language in Art (slide lecture by Glenn Hirsch)
Pattern: A Universal Language in Art (slide lecture by Glenn Hirsch)glennhirsch
 

What's hot (20)

Caravaggio - Genius and Rebel 4
Caravaggio - Genius and Rebel 4Caravaggio - Genius and Rebel 4
Caravaggio - Genius and Rebel 4
 
Tate Britain, London 1.0
Tate Britain, London 1.0Tate Britain, London 1.0
Tate Britain, London 1.0
 
Lady of Shalott
Lady of ShalottLady of Shalott
Lady of Shalott
 
Joaquin Sorolla - Master of Light 1.0
Joaquin Sorolla - Master of Light  1.0Joaquin Sorolla - Master of Light  1.0
Joaquin Sorolla - Master of Light 1.0
 
Women Artists Middle Ages-Neoclassism
Women Artists Middle Ages-NeoclassismWomen Artists Middle Ages-Neoclassism
Women Artists Middle Ages-Neoclassism
 
Joseph Turner
Joseph TurnerJoseph Turner
Joseph Turner
 
Victorianism, Melinda K. Toribiio
Victorianism, Melinda K. ToribiioVictorianism, Melinda K. Toribiio
Victorianism, Melinda K. Toribiio
 
Shakespeare by Aphrodite and Georgia
Shakespeare by Aphrodite and GeorgiaShakespeare by Aphrodite and Georgia
Shakespeare by Aphrodite and Georgia
 
Dulwich Picture Gallery 1.0
Dulwich Picture Gallery 1.0Dulwich Picture Gallery 1.0
Dulwich Picture Gallery 1.0
 
RESIDE_Simon_Toll
RESIDE_Simon_TollRESIDE_Simon_Toll
RESIDE_Simon_Toll
 
Properzia De’ Rossi
Properzia De’ RossiProperzia De’ Rossi
Properzia De’ Rossi
 
The English art in the 19th century
The English art in the 19th century  The English art in the 19th century
The English art in the 19th century
 
Pinacoteca di brera milan 1.0
Pinacoteca di brera milan 1.0Pinacoteca di brera milan 1.0
Pinacoteca di brera milan 1.0
 
Thomas gainsborough
Thomas gainsboroughThomas gainsborough
Thomas gainsborough
 
Shakespeare by Vasiliki and Micaela
Shakespeare by Vasiliki and MicaelaShakespeare by Vasiliki and Micaela
Shakespeare by Vasiliki and Micaela
 
Sorolla por Ally
Sorolla por AllySorolla por Ally
Sorolla por Ally
 
Art
ArtArt
Art
 
Shakespeare by Jenny and Jim
Shakespeare by Jenny and JimShakespeare by Jenny and Jim
Shakespeare by Jenny and Jim
 
Shakespeare by Nick Ch. and Kostas
Shakespeare by Nick Ch. and KostasShakespeare by Nick Ch. and Kostas
Shakespeare by Nick Ch. and Kostas
 
Pattern: A Universal Language in Art (slide lecture by Glenn Hirsch)
Pattern: A Universal Language in Art (slide lecture by Glenn Hirsch)Pattern: A Universal Language in Art (slide lecture by Glenn Hirsch)
Pattern: A Universal Language in Art (slide lecture by Glenn Hirsch)
 

Viewers also liked

Joaquin sorolla y bastida copii pescari portrete
Joaquin sorolla y bastida copii pescari portreteJoaquin sorolla y bastida copii pescari portrete
Joaquin sorolla y bastida copii pescari portreteViorica Munteanu
 
Benjamin Champney White Mountains]
Benjamin Champney  White Mountains]Benjamin Champney  White Mountains]
Benjamin Champney White Mountains]Viorica Munteanu
 
Arta Matematicii Fractalii1
Arta Matematicii Fractalii1Arta Matematicii Fractalii1
Arta Matematicii Fractalii1Viorica Munteanu
 
Claude Monet (1840 1926)
Claude Monet (1840 1926)Claude Monet (1840 1926)
Claude Monet (1840 1926)April Bundridge
 
Diego Rivera Brief Overview ppt
Diego Rivera Brief Overview pptDiego Rivera Brief Overview ppt
Diego Rivera Brief Overview pptajakubowski
 

Viewers also liked (9)

Jacek Yerka Part I
Jacek Yerka Part IJacek Yerka Part I
Jacek Yerka Part I
 
Joaquin sorolla y bastida copii pescari portrete
Joaquin sorolla y bastida copii pescari portreteJoaquin sorolla y bastida copii pescari portrete
Joaquin sorolla y bastida copii pescari portrete
 
Too Pretty To Be Eaten
Too Pretty To Be EatenToo Pretty To Be Eaten
Too Pretty To Be Eaten
 
Kurt Wenner
Kurt WennerKurt Wenner
Kurt Wenner
 
Benjamin Champney White Mountains]
Benjamin Champney  White Mountains]Benjamin Champney  White Mountains]
Benjamin Champney White Mountains]
 
Arte JaponéS
Arte JaponéSArte JaponéS
Arte JaponéS
 
Arta Matematicii Fractalii1
Arta Matematicii Fractalii1Arta Matematicii Fractalii1
Arta Matematicii Fractalii1
 
Claude Monet (1840 1926)
Claude Monet (1840 1926)Claude Monet (1840 1926)
Claude Monet (1840 1926)
 
Diego Rivera Brief Overview ppt
Diego Rivera Brief Overview pptDiego Rivera Brief Overview ppt
Diego Rivera Brief Overview ppt
 

Similar to Evelyn Pckering De Morgan

Romanticism period
Romanticism periodRomanticism period
Romanticism periodnina isna
 
Women in history and literature
Women in history and literatureWomen in history and literature
Women in history and literaturetryfonid
 
Johannes Veermeer Accomplishments
Johannes Veermeer AccomplishmentsJohannes Veermeer Accomplishments
Johannes Veermeer AccomplishmentsTina Mclellan
 
Portrait Of Andouins And Her Daughter By Sofonisba Anguissola
Portrait Of Andouins And Her Daughter By Sofonisba AnguissolaPortrait Of Andouins And Her Daughter By Sofonisba Anguissola
Portrait Of Andouins And Her Daughter By Sofonisba AnguissolaAmber Butler
 
Emily Dickinson & Romanticism
Emily Dickinson & RomanticismEmily Dickinson & Romanticism
Emily Dickinson & RomanticismCarole Mora
 
Influences Of The Romantic Period
Influences Of The Romantic PeriodInfluences Of The Romantic Period
Influences Of The Romantic PeriodCassandra Sirate
 
History of english literature ii
History of english literature  iiHistory of english literature  ii
History of english literature iipascenglishdept
 
Virginia woolf
Virginia woolfVirginia woolf
Virginia woolf佳君 張
 
Los Angles County Museum of Art 2.0
Los Angles County Museum of Art 2.0Los Angles County Museum of Art 2.0
Los Angles County Museum of Art 2.0Jerry Daperro
 
Georgia senor center
Georgia senor centerGeorgia senor center
Georgia senor centerDave Shafer
 
Henry wadsworth longfellow ppt
Henry wadsworth longfellow pptHenry wadsworth longfellow ppt
Henry wadsworth longfellow pptMelaney Zranchev
 
Art Appreciation Topic VIII: Art Movements in the Later 19th Century
Art Appreciation Topic VIII: Art Movements in the Later 19th CenturyArt Appreciation Topic VIII: Art Movements in the Later 19th Century
Art Appreciation Topic VIII: Art Movements in the Later 19th CenturyThomas C.
 
Presentation 7 , The Victorian age
Presentation   7 , The Victorian agePresentation   7 , The Victorian age
Presentation 7 , The Victorian agerupabambhaniya
 

Similar to Evelyn Pckering De Morgan (20)

Portraiture for ks3
Portraiture for ks3Portraiture for ks3
Portraiture for ks3
 
Virginia woolf ok
Virginia woolf okVirginia woolf ok
Virginia woolf ok
 
Romanticism period
Romanticism periodRomanticism period
Romanticism period
 
Leaflet
Leaflet Leaflet
Leaflet
 
Women in history and literature
Women in history and literatureWomen in history and literature
Women in history and literature
 
Johannes Veermeer Accomplishments
Johannes Veermeer AccomplishmentsJohannes Veermeer Accomplishments
Johannes Veermeer Accomplishments
 
O scar wilde
O scar wildeO scar wilde
O scar wilde
 
Jan Vermeer 2.0
Jan Vermeer 2.0Jan Vermeer 2.0
Jan Vermeer 2.0
 
Portrait Of Andouins And Her Daughter By Sofonisba Anguissola
Portrait Of Andouins And Her Daughter By Sofonisba AnguissolaPortrait Of Andouins And Her Daughter By Sofonisba Anguissola
Portrait Of Andouins And Her Daughter By Sofonisba Anguissola
 
DaT guide AW
DaT guide AWDaT guide AW
DaT guide AW
 
Emily Dickinson & Romanticism
Emily Dickinson & RomanticismEmily Dickinson & Romanticism
Emily Dickinson & Romanticism
 
Influences Of The Romantic Period
Influences Of The Romantic PeriodInfluences Of The Romantic Period
Influences Of The Romantic Period
 
History of english literature ii
History of english literature  iiHistory of english literature  ii
History of english literature ii
 
Virginia woolf
Virginia woolfVirginia woolf
Virginia woolf
 
Los Angles County Museum of Art 2.0
Los Angles County Museum of Art 2.0Los Angles County Museum of Art 2.0
Los Angles County Museum of Art 2.0
 
Georgia senor center
Georgia senor centerGeorgia senor center
Georgia senor center
 
Henry wadsworth longfellow ppt
Henry wadsworth longfellow pptHenry wadsworth longfellow ppt
Henry wadsworth longfellow ppt
 
Art Appreciation Topic VIII: Art Movements in the Later 19th Century
Art Appreciation Topic VIII: Art Movements in the Later 19th CenturyArt Appreciation Topic VIII: Art Movements in the Later 19th Century
Art Appreciation Topic VIII: Art Movements in the Later 19th Century
 
Presentation 7 , The Victorian age
Presentation   7 , The Victorian agePresentation   7 , The Victorian age
Presentation 7 , The Victorian age
 
Elizabethan Poetry Essay
Elizabethan Poetry EssayElizabethan Poetry Essay
Elizabethan Poetry Essay
 

More from Viorica Munteanu

More from Viorica Munteanu (20)

Asculta -listen
Asculta -listenAsculta -listen
Asculta -listen
 
Nativity
NativityNativity
Nativity
 
Margaret Kent, Irish Painter
Margaret Kent, Irish PainterMargaret Kent, Irish Painter
Margaret Kent, Irish Painter
 
Fitzgerald park, cork, ireland
Fitzgerald park, cork, irelandFitzgerald park, cork, ireland
Fitzgerald park, cork, ireland
 
Bucuresti februarie 2012
Bucuresti februarie 2012Bucuresti februarie 2012
Bucuresti februarie 2012
 
Bucuresti 5 februarie 2012
Bucuresti 5 februarie 2012Bucuresti 5 februarie 2012
Bucuresti 5 februarie 2012
 
Kandy Reisenauer
Kandy ReisenauerKandy Reisenauer
Kandy Reisenauer
 
Steluta nistorescu -spiritualitate si pictura
Steluta nistorescu -spiritualitate si picturaSteluta nistorescu -spiritualitate si pictura
Steluta nistorescu -spiritualitate si pictura
 
Elena niculescu
Elena niculescuElena niculescu
Elena niculescu
 
Vladimir volegov -children
Vladimir volegov -childrenVladimir volegov -children
Vladimir volegov -children
 
Alexei antonov
Alexei antonovAlexei antonov
Alexei antonov
 
St peter and paul church -cork--ireland
St peter and paul church -cork--irelandSt peter and paul church -cork--ireland
St peter and paul church -cork--ireland
 
Is there where everything began
Is there where everything beganIs there where everything began
Is there where everything began
 
Nyiragongo crater - journey to the center of the world
Nyiragongo crater - journey to the center of the worldNyiragongo crater - journey to the center of the world
Nyiragongo crater - journey to the center of the world
 
God's own country -kerala
God's own country -keralaGod's own country -kerala
God's own country -kerala
 
Puyehue volcano eruption
Puyehue volcano eruptionPuyehue volcano eruption
Puyehue volcano eruption
 
Kerala -houseboats
Kerala -houseboatsKerala -houseboats
Kerala -houseboats
 
Haiga -dumitru rosu, vali iancu
Haiga -dumitru rosu, vali iancuHaiga -dumitru rosu, vali iancu
Haiga -dumitru rosu, vali iancu
 
New york aerial pictures
New york aerial picturesNew york aerial pictures
New york aerial pictures
 
David croitor
David croitorDavid croitor
David croitor
 

Evelyn Pckering De Morgan

  • 2. http://www.artmagick.com/pictures/artist.aspx?artist=evelyn-pickering-de-morgan Mary Evelyn De Morgan, née Pickering, was a late-Victorian artist who lived and worked in a period marked by cataclysmic changes. Born mid-century in an England ruled over by Queen Victoria, she lived to see a series of changes climaxing in 1914 with the collapse of established world order. It was amidst this atmosphere of increasing uncertainty and anxiety that De Morgan came to maturity and developed her personal and artistic philosophies. Throughout her career as a painter, she used literary allusion and allegory to express her strongly held views on contemporary spiritual, social and moral issues.
  • 3. Despite initial parental disapproval of her chosen career, Evelyn was a privileged woman. She enjoyed an upper-class lifestyle in London; excellent home education; instruction at the South Kensington National Art Training School (1872) and at the Slade School of Art (1873-76) under Edward J. Poynter. She had the artistic as well as moral support of her uncle, the Pre-Raphaelite painter John Roddam Spencer Stanhope (1829-1908). These advantages, when combined with Evelyn’s prodigious talent and early decision to devote her life to art, moulded a temperament that was confident and not easily deterred by obstacles such as familial apathy, the condescension of male artists and critics, and lack of robust patronage.
  • 4. In the early 1880s, Evelyn moved her studio from her family home in Bryanston Square to the popular Trafalgar Studios in Manresa Road, Chelsea. During this period, she lived as a professional artist in London with periodic trips to Italy where she would absorb the influences of the early Italian masters. While it is likely that she spent much of this period of her life perfecting her craft, she also took an active part in the artistic/social scene of the day. With friends such as Violet Paget, Emily Susan Ford, Margaret Burne-Jones and Mary De Morgan, she attended the theatre, Royal Academy openings and art studio open-house events.
  • 5. Some time during the mid 1880s she met the ceramic designer William De Morgan (1839-1917) and his family. This introduction to the bohemian and intellectual De Morgan family was clearly a turning point in her life. Her future mother-in-law, the spiritualist and social activist Sophia Frend De Morgan (1809-1892) became her informal mentor, helping to further develop the younger woman’s interest in spiritualist practices and in social reform. In 1887 Evelyn married William De Morgan. Despite the age difference theirs was a harmonious and mutually supportive marriage. In addition to their artistic pursuits, they shared a well-documented sense of humour and an idealistic spirit.
  • 6. Their mutual interests included social reform, spiritualism and music. Evelyn provided financial and moral support for her husband’s pottery business, which though successful required much capital. From the early 1890s, in the interest of William’s health, Evelyn enthusiastically accompanied him on extended stays to Florence every winter. As fellow artists, they led an idyllic life in Italy: Evelyn created her pictures, while William worked on his ceramic designs with the Italian painters he had hired. The De Morgans spent their weekends in the hills above Florence, at the sumptuous Bellosguardo villa where Spencer Stanhope had made his permanent home.
  • 7. During her lifetime Evelyn De Morgan produced approximately 102 oil paintings and over 300 drawings. At first glance, works like Flora (1894), Cadmus and Harmonia (1877), Eos (1895) and Night and Sleep (1878) appear to be that of a typical mid-century literary painter influenced by the work of Spencer Stanhope, Watts and Burne-Jones. Consequently, this was the way in which most contemporary critics assessed her paintings: Many do reflect the usual conventions and literary subjects of late Victorian art with its Pre-Raphaelite traces and neo-classical tendencies. However, looking closer, one discovers Symbolist works that employ the language of Christian allegory to reveal the artist’s engagement with the contemporary issues of her time.
  • 8. Because of the nexus between spiritualism and feminism during the late Victorian era, Evelyn, like her fellow female artists, sought new heroines with which to construct her own images of Victorian womanhood. Hence, she painted portraits of strong-minded biblical and classical women such as Ruth and Naomi, the Virgin Mary, Medea, Ariadne, Cassandra and Helen of Troy. In addition to these portrayals, Evelyn sought a new heroic female type, which could embody spiritual empowerment. For Evelyn, who had struggled to overcome the limitations of gender and class to find fulfillment, the figure of the female martyr seems to have become a particularly apt symbol of feminine spiritual power and social responsibility .
  • 9. These works may be divided into three categories: spiritualist allegories, depictions of sacred heroines, and war paintings. In 1914, as war approached, Evelyn and William De Morgan left Italy for the last time and returned to Chelsea to live and work. The Great War of 1914-1918 unnerved both these idealists, whose lives had been devoted to art and beauty. Despite her horror of war, Evelyn did not shrink from recording her response. Again she used the language of Christian allegory to paint pictures representing violence, pain, loss and, finally, redemption .
  • 10. William De Morgan died, probably of influenza, in 1917. Evelyn lived on until 1919, painting and attending to William’s artistic legacy. She lived to see the end of the war, but not the signing of the Treaty of Versailles. In 1916, her last exhibition was held at her Chelsea studio. It included works such as S.O.S (s.d.), 1914 (1914), The Field of the Slain (s.d.) and The Red Cross (s.d.) and was organized for the benefit of the British and Italian Red Cross.
  • 11. An Angel pipping to the Souls in Hell
  • 13. Boreas and Oreithya Cadmus and Harmonia
  • 17. Flora Gloria in Excelsis
  • 18. Helen of Troy Hero holding the beacon for Lender
  • 19. Hope in the Prison of Despair
  • 21. Our Lady of Peace Luna
  • 22. Lux in Tenebris Medeea
  • 25. Port after Stormy Seas--Spencer’s Faerie Queene
  • 26. Queen Eleanor and Fair Rosamund
  • 28. The Angel of Death The Crown of Glory
  • 29. The Cadence of Autumn
  • 31. The Field of the Slain
  • 33. The Hour Glass The Love Potion
  • 35. Tobias and the Angel The Red Cross (Allegory of Flander War Graves)
  • 38. The Valley of Shadows
  • 40. The Worship of Mammon