Study of a woman seated in a park with two gentlemen behind her

Frederick Walker ARA (1840 - 1875)

RA Collection: Art

The drawing depicts a woman seated in a park holding a fringed parasol. Her eyes cast down on the ground, her left hand resting upwards on her lap, and the parasol sunk down on her shoulder, the woman appears deep in thought and unaware of the bustle around her. Behind her on the right sits a gentleman wearing a top hat and holding a cane. To the left stands another gentleman in a top hat with his right hand in his pocket. In the background are a number of figures walking in different directions, so creating a sense of business in contrast to the stillness of the woman in the foreground.

The work is in pen and ink with the woman in the foreground drawn in the most detail and a sense of depth created by a sparser use of line behind her. The faintness of the figures in the background is also suggestive of their distance from her thoughts, or even their distance from the artist's thoughts as his focus is centred on the woman.

Frederick Walker was an illustrator and painter; the highly finished quality of this drawing suggests that it may have been intended for reproduction in a wood-engraved book or as a magazine illustration.