Study of a standing female nude by Sir Edward Coley Burne-Jones, Bt ARA 1933-1898

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Portrait of Miss Wyndham, aged sixteen

Sir Edward Coley Burne-Jones, Bt ARA (1833-1898)

mid-1880s

Green chalk on cream paper

12 x 8 1/2 inches, 30.5 x 21.5 cm..

Provenance: Lady Burne-jones and her daughter, Margaret Mackail. Given to Mrs. Percy Wyndham, the sitter's mother, Christmas 1888. Bequeathed to the sitter then Mrs. Charles Adeane, 1920. Given to her son Robert Charles Wyndham Adeane on his marriage, 1929. Thence by descent to 1986. Private collection

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Madeline Wyndham was one of the five children of Mr. & Mrs. Percy Wyndham. This family was at the core of the Society coterie that formed in the 1880s, known as 'the Souls'. The Countess of Warwick wrote: 'This little coterie of "Souls" loved literature and art, and perhaps were more pagan than soulful' (quoted in Abdy and Gere, 11). Their circle was conspicuous among the British aristocracy for its intellect and culture. Burne-jones was one of their chosen painters. He worked for many members of the group, including Arthur Balfour, Lady Windsor, Lady Horner, and the Wyndham Family. He, was also invited to their country house parties. In their own words, he was 'an occasional Soul'. He seems to have been closest to the Wyndham Family, whose house, Clouds in Wiltshire, was designed by Philip Webb between 1881 and 1885 and decorated by Morris & Co. The Wyndhams also had a London house at 44 Belgrave Square. According to Lady Elcho, Burne-jones's two children, Philip and Margaret, were like children of the house.

Jane Abdy & Charlotte Gere, authors of a study of the 'Souls', describe Madeline (d. 1941) as 'in many ways the unknown Wyndham' (87). Her shy personality was overshadowed by her two dynamic sisters, Mary (Lady Elcho) and Pamela (Mrs. Tennant). Nevertheless the three were known as the 'Three Graces' of the Souls. On 23rd July 1888, Madeline married Charles Adeane of Babraham in Cambridgeshire and moved away from the group. Nevertheless she appeared with her two married sisters in Sargent's famous portrait group, 'The Wyndham Sisters' (1900 Metropolitan Museum, New York). There she appears as a polished Society Lady. In the present drawing Burne-jones represents her as a tentative girl on the brink of womanhood. The gift of the drawing to her mother, so soon after her daughter's marriage, is particularly poignant.

Bibliography

Abdy, J. and Charlotte Gere. The Souls. Sidgewick & Jackson, London 1984.

Fitzgerald, Penelope. Edward Burne-Jones, a Biography. Michael Joseph, London 1975.

Morgan, Hilary and Nahum, Peter. Burne-Jones, The Pre-Raphaelites and Their Century. London: Peter Nahum, 1989. Catalogue number 77.

Last modified 2 January 2002