SOLD
Country of origin: England
Medium: Oil on original canvas
Signed: Signed & dated lower left
Dated: 1895
Condition: Excellent original condition
Size: 34.00" x 50.00" (86.4cm x 127.0cm)
Framed size: 40.00" x 56.00" (101.6cm x 142.2cm)
Provenance: Walter Herries Pollock, "The Hon. John Collier," The Art Annual, London, 1914, p. 6, illustrated
Further information: John Collier was a leading English painter who worked mostly in the Pre-Raphaelite style. All Hallowe’en is a psychologically charged and mysterious composition, featuring a young woman clad in a nightgown who looks at her reflection in the haunting glow of a candle. Her expression is difficult to read, and the artist does not reveal what it is that has caught her eye behind her and what might be partially reflected in the glass. This work belongs to a series of “problem paintings” by the artist, which feature ambiguous and inconclusive dilemmas, many of which took place in domestic settings.
John Collier began his artistic education with Sir Edward John Poynter before going to Paris and studying under J.P. Laurens. He also worked with Alma Tadema.
He exhibited in London at the Royal Academy, at Suffolk Street and the Grosvenor Gallery between 1874 and 1893. He also exhibited at exhibitions in Sydney. He was a member of the Institute of Painters in Oil Colours. In 1932 he exhibited a Portrait of the Artist at the Salon des Artistes Français.
Museum and Gallery Holdings
Blackburn: Hetty Sorrel; Portrait of A.N. Hornoy
Florence (Uffizi): Self-portrait (1907, oil on canvas)
London (National Portrait Gal.): Charles Robert Darwin (1883 (1881), oil on canvas, replica); Thomas Henry Huxley (1883, oil on canvas); William Kingdon Clifford (1889, oil on canvas, reduced replica)
London (Tate Collection): Mrs Huxley (c. 1927-1928, oil on canvas); The Last Voyage of Henry Hudson (exhibited in 1881, oil on canvas)
London (Victoria and Albert Mus.): Portrait of the Hon. Lord Masham, Bt.
Sydney: The Lute Player; Portrait of J.L. Toale