The Visitation, 1863. Watercolour and gouache on paper, 17 ½ x 9 ⅛ inches (44.2 x 23 cm). Private collection. Click on image to enlarge it.
In the mid-1860s Halliday, an amateur artist, was surprisingly commissioned on occasion by the well-known firm of Lavers & Barraud to provide them with designs for stained glass. Two of his most notable designs, as well as his first for the firm, were The Visitation and The Nativity for two of the south wall Chancel windows for the church of St. Columbia in the village of Topcliffe in North Yorkshire.
This particular design was for the centre lancet. The Visitation portrays the visit of the Virgin Mary, pregnant with the Christ child, to her cousin Elizabeth, who was pregnant with John the Baptist. The commission was initially given to Edward Burne-Jones who designed The Annunciation window to the left. How Burne-Jones came to lose the commission is an interesting story in itself. As he himself explained: “Once, in the ardour of youth, I tried an innovation. It was a mistake. I drew an Annunciation with Mary taking the Dove to her bosom; and when the architect who had commissioned me (he was a very good architect – Butterfield it was) objected I wouldn’t alter it. So he would never give me anything more to do, and he was quite right – and I lost the chance of a lot of work” (Lago, 28). William Butterfield thought Mary’s pose sacrilegious and give the commission for the centre and right-hand panels to Halliday.
Bibliography
Lago, Mary Ed. Burne-Jones Talking. London: John Murray, 1982.
Last modified 20 February 2022