In Clover. 1879. Oil on canvas; 21 3/8 x 34 3/8 inches (54.2 x 87.2 cm). Collection of the Walker Art Gallery, Liverpool. Accession no. WAG 1329. Kindly made available on the Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International (CC BY-NC 4.0) licence. [Click on the image to enlarge it.]
This work epitomizes the Idyllic School showing an idealised vision of everyday rural life with four young girls eating their mid-day meal in a stable and enjoying themselves by happily chatting amongst themselves. Bright sunlight streams in through an open door to illuminate the scene from the right. Although the floor of the stable is strewn with clover, in this case Macbeth intends a pun where the expression 'in clover' implies living a comfortable life. Donato Esposito feels that Macbeth borrowed the general idea for the composition from G. J. Pinwell's illustration to "Kitty Morris," published in Wayside Posies in 1867, and that his "vivid colouring" was influenced by Pinwell's watercolour King Pippin of 1866 (145).
This work was exhibited at the Royal Academy in 1880, no. 149. It was not widely reviewed, likely because Macbeth had sent his more important works to the Grosvenor Gallery that year. A critic for The Art Journal merely stated: "R. W. Macbeth's In Clover (149), some peasants at their repast in an outhouse, while a horse looks in and nibbles at the clover" (187). The Times was even briefer: "there is less that we can see of paintable matter in Mr. Macbeth's In Clover (149), girls and a horse in a clover-strewed stable."
Bibliography
Esposito, Donato. Frederick Walker and the Idyllists. London: Lund Humphries, 2017. See Chapter 6, 136 & 145.
Morris, Edward. Victorian & Edwardian Paintings in the Walker Art Gallery and at Sudley House. London: HMSO Publications, 1996, 292.
"The Royal Academy Exhibition." The Art Journal New Series XIX (1880): 186-88.
"Royal Academy Exhibition." The Times (19 May 1880).
Created 1 June 2023