Three studies for 'Love and Death', 1870s-80s

George Frederic Watts RA (1817 - 1904)

RA Collection: Art

Three studies of limbs in black and white chalk for 'Love and Death' (c. 1885-87, Tate Britain).

In the finished painting 'Love' is represented by a young boy but Watts appears to have made these studies from a female model. Watts used models of different sexes in preparatory studies for a number of his other works. His famous sculpture of Clytie (c. 1868-78, Tate Britain), for instance, was based on the combination of a male model, Watts's favourite female model 'Long Mary', his first wife Ellen Terry and the infant Margaret Burne-Jones.

Further reading:

https://www.tate.org.uk/art/artworks/watts-love-and-death-n01645

Alison Smith ed., Exposed: The Victorian Nude, exhib. cat., Tate Britain, London 2001, cat. no. 48