Forgotten Faces

Interesting display at Tate Britain of portraits from their collection which have been stars of gallery in the early 20th century but have since fallen from fashion with the popularity of Modernism.

I must be an old fashioned girl because I thought there were some lovely pictures. I already knew the beautiful Edwardian lady walking her dogs “Diana of the Uplands” by Charles Wellington Firse well from a National Portrait Gallery exhibition but I can’t for the life of me remember which one. I just remember that the woman in the portrait, his wife, went on to be head of the Wrens and girl guides!

I think my favourites were the two by Ralph Peacock one of his wife’s sister Ethel and one of his wife and Ethel together. They are both lovely pensive pictures of Edwardian girls. I loved the commentary on one picture by Gerard Kelly which said he was “as famous in his day as he is forgotten now.”

The show was a good example of why you shouldn’t just show the fashionable in galleries everything has a right to be rediscovered.

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