Silvia Constance Myers; Eveleen Myers (née Tennant)

1 portrait of Eveleen Myers (née Tennant)

© National Portrait Gallery, London

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Silvia Constance Myers; Eveleen Myers (née Tennant)

by Eveleen Myers (née Tennant)
platinum print, late 1890s
9 4/4 in. x 7 1/2 in. (247 mm x 192 mm)
Purchased, 1991
Photographs Collection
NPG Ax68522

Sittersback to top

  • Eveleen Myers (née Tennant) (1856-1937), Photographer. Sitter associated with 30 portraits, Artist or producer associated with 203 portraits.
  • Silvia Constance Myers (1883-1957), Daughter of Eveleen Myers. Sitter associated with 44 portraits, Artist or producer of 1 portrait.

Artistback to top

  • Eveleen Myers (née Tennant) (1856-1937), Photographer. Artist or producer associated with 203 portraits, Sitter associated with 30 portraits.

Linked publicationsback to top

  • Rideal, Liz, Mirror Mirror: Self-portraits by Women Artists, 2001 (accompanying the exhibition at the National Portrait Gallery from 12 September 2001 to 20 January 2002), p. 51 Read entry

    Like many photographic self-portraits, for example Helen Chadwick's, this image was self-evidently staged and it is clear that Eveleen Myers organised the pose and setting in addition to the inclusion of her only daughter in the portrait. It may be that it was a specific occasion she wished to record, as this is one of several images and Eveleen's gown is clearly very special. Deenagh Goold-Adams, Eveleen's granddaughter, wrote the following about her grandmother in her later life:

    she concocted her own hats much as a bird builds a nest but with considerable artistry

    She never threw anything away and revived ancient confections by the famous 'Lucille' by sewing on new furbelows ... She had something which is described in the jargon of today as 'star quality' and I am sure she would have been noticed in any age and in any walk of life.

    (Typescript with Myers papers, Trinity College, Cambridge)

    Eveleen Myers, née Tennant, was the youngest of three sisters, born in Russell Square, London. Following her marriage in 1880 to the writer Frederic Myers (1843-1901), she moved to Leckhampton House, Cambridge, which had been especially designed for the couple by the architect William Marshall. As a young girl she was actively involved in the salon society of her family, and her mother introduced her to artists, writers and political figures. Both she and her sister Dorothy were painted by Sir John Everett Millais and George Frederic Watts (1817-1904) in works that were exhibited at the Royal Academy. Eveleen visited the Isle of Wight as a child and sat to the photographer Julia Margaret Cameron (1815-79). This occasion obviously made an impression as in 1888, ostensibly in order to record the childhood of her sons Leopold and Harold, she took up photography. She also owned original prints by Cameron. It is possible that she wished to make a portrait together with her elder child and only daughter to complement the series of her younger children. It is a perfectly poignant moment in time, utterly nostalgic and autobiographical: a mother and daughter.

    Myers showed her work at the Linked Ring Salon in the 1890s and four of her works were illustrated in photogravure in the 1891 issue of Sun Artists. But after her husband died in 1901, Myers left their Cambridge home with her darkroom and studio and gave up photography. In 1991 the National Portrait Gallery acquired two of her personal albums, thereby enhancing an earlier collection of portraits which includes those of Robert Browning and W. E. Gladstone. Myers' work was featured, along with that of Olive Edis, in an exhibition at the Gallery entitled Edwardian Women Photographers in 1994.

Placesback to top

Linked displays and exhibitionsback to top

Events of 1897back to top

Current affairs

Queen Victoria's Diamond Jubilee is marked by a series of celebratory events, and attended by eleven colonial prime ministers following the Colonial Secretary Joseph Chamberlain's proposal that the Jubilee be made a festival of the British Empire.
The Workmen's Compensation Act gives workmen a right to a limited compensation in every case of injury by accident arising from the course of employment; it is a landmark piece of legislation in employment law.

Art and science

Bram Stoker's Dracula is first published.
Henry Tate of the Tate and Lyle sugar company donates his art collection to the nation, buying land and building a gallery space for it (now Tate Britain).
Physician and psychologist Havelock Ellis publishes the first volume of his Studies in the Psychology of Sex, and the English physicist John Thompson discovers the existence of the electron.

International

The burning of Benin city by Britain takes place, known also as the Punitive Exhibition of 1897. The excursion, led by Admiral Sir Harry Rawson, was a response to an attack by Benin warriors on a British delegation sent to settle a dispute over customs duties collected by British traders. During the expedition the British Admiralty destroyed much of the city's treasured art, including the Benin Bronzes, auctioning off the rest as war booty to recoup costs.

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