Lot 115: Michael Frederick Halliday (1822-1869)

Study for 'The Blind Basket Maker with his first Child' signed with monogram and dated '1858' (lower right) and signed, inscribed and dated 'The Blind Basket Maker with his/first Child/Michael F. Halliday. 1858' (on the reverse) oil on panel 10 x 5 7/8 in. (25.4 x 14.9 cm.) PROVENANCE with J.S. Maas & Co., London, from whom acquired by the present owner in 1977. EXHIBITION Childhood in Victorian England, 1985, no. 18. Victorian Childhood, 1986, cat. pl. 16. The Age of Innocence, 1989. NOTES This is a sketch for Halliday's Royal Academy work of 1858, no. 459, deemed 'the most successful that this fast-rising artist has yet exhibited' by the critic of The Literary Gazette. Halliday was an intimate friend of many in the Pre-Raphaelite circle. With Millais he shared a passion for hunting, shooting and fishing, and the younger artist also had a hand in the work on which Halliday's reputation principally rests, The Measure for the Wedding Ring, which was formerly in the collection of Evelyn Waugh. Halliday also shared a studio in Pimilico and Campden Hill with Holman Hunt, who he accompanied back from the Holy Land in 1855. Both artists influenced Halliday's development, and in composition, colour and sentiment, the present picture owes a debt to their earlier Pre-Raphaelite work. It is probably no coincidence that Millais's The Blind Girl, (now in Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery) was exhibited at the Royal Academy in 1856, the year this picture was painted. The poignancy of Halliday's image lies in the several reminders of the acuity of the basket maker's remaining senses. His wife holds his hand over his child's face so he can feel its breath, while the family cat rubs itself against his legs. Against the light streaming from the window lies a violin, while a bird kept for its song stands in its cage above them. All this he can hear and feel but not see. Too often, to twentieth century eyes, such images have appeared overly sentimental. Yet Halliday has used every means at his disposal to engage the viewer's empathy with the basket maker's fate. He has tried to let us imagine, at one of life's most joyous moments, what it is to be blind. Little is known of Halliday who was born the son of a ship's captain, and who worked as a parliamentary clerk in the House of Lords from 1839. This position gave him the independence to pursue a part-time career as a painter, and act as picture dealer, finding clients among his professional acquaintances for works by his Pre-Raphaelite friends. He exhibited at the Royal Academy between 1853 and 1866: his obituary in the Art Journal of 1869 described him as 'one of the most successful amateur artists of the day'.