Terms and conditions of use
The mitherless bairn
1855
Medium
oil on wood panel
Measurements
63.2 × 90.0 cm
Credit Line
National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne
Purchased, 1886
© Public Domain
Gallery location
19th Century European Paintings Gallery
Level 2, NGV International
About this work
Foundlings have long occupied a different position to the illegitimate child – like Moses – believed to have a potentially unique parentage and destiny which merited their protection. The Mitherless bairn features a ‘foundling’ who begged entry to the home of a large impoverished family which, despite its tatters, displays all the hallmarks of virtue. Faed was well aware of the potential of child subjects to convey powerful ideas, famously exhorting fellow artists to ‘paint the gutter children rather than Helen of Troy, Agamemnon or Achilles’.
Artwork Details
Place/s of Execution
London, England
Inscription
inscribed in brown paint l.r.: Faed. 1855 / London
Accession Number
p.311.11-1
Department
International Painting
This digital record has been made available on NGV Collection Online through the generous support of Digitisation Champion Ms Carol Grigor through Metal Manufactures Limited
Subjects (general)
Human Figures Interiors Relationships and Interactions
Subjects (specific)
boys children (people by age group) elderly families (kinship groups) infants orphans poor (people) women (female humans)
Provenance
Exhibited Royal Academy, London, 1855, no. 141; purchased from the artist by Henry Wallis (dealer), London, 1855; collection of Calvert Toulmin (1815–86), Bayswater, London, by 1871–86; included in the sale Christie's, London, 26 June 1886, no. 45; from where purchased by Agnew's (dealer), London, 1886, stock no. 4119; from where purchased, on the advice of Alfred Taddy Thompson, for the NGV, 29 June 1886.