Portraits in disguise - NPG x19680
Mary Frances Crane (née Andrews) as Laura; Walter Crane as Cimabue
by Sir Emery Walker
1897?
NPG x19680
Here we see Walter Crane (1845-1915) and his wife (d.1915) dressed for a tableau which he organised as part of a celebration fancy dress ball to commemorate the sumptuous new Piccadilly buildings of the Royal Institute of Painters in Watercolours in May 1885. Various friends and artistic colleagues took roles in the tableau, which represented the Arts of Italy. Crane went as Cimabue, and his wife as Laura, the inspiration of Petrarch's love poetry. The reputation of Cimabue was revived in the later nineteenth century as a key figure in the development of European painting. Lord Leighton's painting, 'Cimabue's Madonna carried in procession', was purchased by Queen Victoria for six hundreds guineas when exhibited at the Royal Academy in 1855, and it made his name. It now belongs to Her Majesty the Queen.
Link
'Cimabue's
Madonna carried in procession'
Weedon Grossmith and his bride
by Alfred Ellis, 1895
NPG X16925 (Detail)
This pair are
dressed in up to the minute fashion for 1895. He wears the standard
frockcoat with silk lapels. She wears a travelling outfit with
button back fronts and cartridge pleated 'leg of mutton' sleeves.
