Elizabeth Siddall, 25 July 1829 – 11 February 1862

I have seen headlines for a lot of articles today about Elizabeth Siddall/Siddal, also known as Lizzie, Victorian artist and poet, who died much too young; I’m planning to Spotify said articles tomorrow, and will post the link here. Every one of these pieces is testament to Elizabeth not having been forgotten in the 186 years since she was born. She is one of my favourite artists, and it’s tragic that her adult life was so marked by illness and heartbreak, by addiction and depression, affecting her strength and ability to get the renown as an artist that her work deserved. You can read more about her life here.

Clerk Saunders, by Elizabeth Siddall. Watercolour, 1857. Image via: Lizziesiddal.com

I’ve seen many of her pen and ink drawings, and watercolour paintings, most recently at Tate Britain’s exhibition Pre-Raphaelites: Victorian Avant-Garde in 2013, of which the watercolour Clerk Saunders to the left is one. It is based on Walter Scott’s ballad of the same name, which appeared in his first edition of the Minstrelsy of the Scottish Border (1802). Siddall was clearly talented. The colours are beautiful, and the figures very well-drawn. The gesture of May Margaret on the bed is particularly intriguing in its passion – what is she holding in, or at, her mouth? Something to ponder…

But my favourite of all her works is the pen and ink drawing of The Lady of Shalott at Her Loom (pen and ink on paper, 1853, Jeremy Maas Gallery (in 1985). See below.). It’s a very different work to the famous paintings of the unfortunate Lady, such as those by John William Waterhouse (oil paint on canvas, 1888, Tate Britain) and William Holman Hunt (oil on panel, Manchester City Galleries, c.1886–1905), in its simplicity. The Lady seems lost in a moment of contemplation, turning away from the mirror. But the loose threads of the loom appear to writhe like snakes, and thus add an unsettling element to the drawing.

The Lady of Shalott at Her Loom, by Elizabeth Eleanor Siddal (1834-1862). Pen and ink on paper, Jeremy Maas Gallery (in 1985). Image via the Victorian Web.

When conducting some researching into the Pre-Raphaelites a few years ago, I came across this letter from Dante Gabriel Rossetti to his mother, written in 1855. He describes how he had visited the Bodleian Library – with Lizzie (whom he called Guggum).

Besides Clevedon, I went to Oxford some weeks ago when Guggum was there, and met some nice people … A great swell, who is Warden of New College . . . showed her all the finest MSS. in the Bodleian Library.

Source: Dante Gabriel Rossetti, The correspondence of Dante Gabriel Rossetti, edited by William E. Fredeman, D. S. Brewer, Cambridge, 2002, vol. 2, p. 51.

The medieval influence on her work is clear in the images I have included here; consider the jewel-like colours in the watercolour Clerk Saunders. The thought of Elizabeth having the opportunity to see such beautiful books and manuscripts delights me. Another small glimpse into her personality comes from Georgiana Burne-Jones mentioning, in her two volume memoir of her husband, how Elizabeth signed a letter “with a willow-pattern dish full of love to you” (I cannot find the reference right now, but will post it later when I do). Isn’t that wonderful? It suggests a funny, imaginative woman with a love of whimsy, very different to the silent, sad Elizabeth, the graceful model who fell ill when posing for Millais’ Ophelia, then tragic laudanum addict, who is the Elizabeth Siddall more generally known to us. The more I see of her’s art, the more I read of her poetry, the more alive she becomes to me.

Happy Birthday, Lizzie! A willow-pattern dish full of love to you!

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