Titled “Allegorical Painting of Two Ladies, English School”, the painting presents a black female sitter and her white companion as counterparts, as they sport similar clothing, hair, jewelry and makeup.
In the 1650s it was unusual for a painting to depict a black female sitter, especially an adult, as opposed to a child in a position of subjugation, prompting the “important debate about race and gender during the period”. According to spark, press statement.
The painting is also unique because both women are depicted wearing the same “beauty patch”, a type of cosmetic embellishment of the face that was in fashion in the 17th century. The “sin of pride” is inscribed on their faces, according to the statement.
The style of the work is related to the popular woodcut prints of the time, implying that the composition is allegorical and associated with satirical poetry, sermons and pamphlets.
UK Arts Minister Stephen Parkinson, better known as Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay, decided to bar the export with the help of the Review Committee on the Export of Objects of Art and Cultural Interest (RCEWA) – an independent body that provides impartial advice. gives. On those items which are of national importance to the country.
“This fascinating painting has much to teach us about England in the 17th century, including important areas of race and gender that continue to attract attention and research today,” said Parkinson.
“I hope that a gallery or museum in the UK can be found to buy this painting for the country, so that many more people can be part of the ongoing research and discussion,” he said.
“This anonymous painting is a great rarity in British art, as a mid-seventeenth-century work in which a black woman and a white woman are given equal status. It is not a portrait of real people, as far as we know, But the inscription shows that it is actually a harsh moral image that condemns the use of cosmetics, and especially the elaborate beauty patches that were in vogue at the time,” wrote RCEWA members Pippa Shirley and Christopher Baker. said in the statement of DCMS.
“Although not artistically iconic, its imagery relates to contemporary stereotypes through a combination of women, fashion, and figures, caste, in fascinating ways.
“The fact that it emerged recently, and that only one other related painting is known so far, and that it can be used to trace important aspects of black culture in seventeenth-century Britain, in particular What makes it important is that it remains in this country so that its meaning can be widely studied and understood.”
Shirley and Baker said that further research could show how the picture is linked to contemporary artwork and texts and the purposes for which it was created and used.
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