Head of the Magdalene (after Sandro Botticelli)

Christiana Jane Herringham (1852-1929)

c.1888-97

Tempera on panel

H 45 cm; W 28.5

Royal Holloway, University of London (Accession no. PO746).

Presented to Bedford College by Sir Wilmot Herringham, before its amalgamation with Royal Holloway, and on display outside the main Picture Gallery. [See commentary below, and bibliography].

Photograph and text by Jacqueline Banerjee.

Photograph reproduced here by courtesy of Royal Holloway, University London. [Click on the image to enlarge it.]

Another of the ten or more copies made by Herringham of Botticelli's work, which was enjoying a surge of popularity in the late Victorian period, this is copied from his Sant’Ambrogio altarpiece, now in the Uffizi in Florence. The almost transparent veil and glinting halo are extremely delicately painted and very beautiful. The traditional golden hair is not hidden but softened by the veil, and the face is luminous. To say that Herringham was a "copyist" hardly does justice to her skills.

Related Material

Sant’Ambrogio altarpiece (source: the Web Gallery of Art)

Head of St Catherine (also from the altarpiece)

Bibliography

"Madonna and Child with Six Saints" (Sant'Ambrogio Altarpiece). Web. 7 November 2019.

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Christiana
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Created 7 November 2019