William Worcester Churchill

[porphyry]

 


As far as I can tell, Churchill was strictly an academic traditionalist, as shown in the actual painting. But the painting-within-a-painting has points of contact with Art Nouveau and Symbolist painting of this period (about 1910), that you just don't see in his own work. I wonder if the subject is an actual friend of his who painted in a more modern style, his attempt to to engage with those developments--or perhaps satire (the painting shown isn't exactly a Bocklin or von Stuck masterpiece)).