The Sensitive Palnt, by Sir Frank Dicksee (1853–1928). Pencil, watercolour and gouache with scratching out on paper. 7 1/2 x 4 3/4 inches (19 x 12.5 cm). Private collection, image ©2010 Christie's Images Limited. [Right click disabled; not to be reproduced.]
This small but charming watercolour features a beautiful young woman with long golden-brown hair in a garden pouring water from her left hand over flowers in an outdoor metal planter. She is getting the water from a copper vessel at her feet. The time is twilight. A row of trees forms the background to the left, while a range of blue hills can be seen to the right. When the work sold at Dreweatts in 2025 their experts said: "The dramatic yet subtle lighting are typical of Dicksee's style. The warm glow of light in the present watercolour is particularly characteristic. This awareness of the possibilities of light may well have been encouraged by Dicksee's early experience of working in stained glass with Henry Holiday" (130).
The title of the watercolour is derived from Percy Bysshe Shelley's poem "A Sensitive Plant" of 1820:
A Sensitive Plant in a garden grew,
And the young winds fed it with silver dew,
And it opened its fan-like leaves to the light.
And closed them beneath the kisses of Night.
Shelley's subject here was not a common one for Victorian artists. In 1898, however, Laurence Housman did twelve full-page black and white illustrations for this book published by Aldine House; and in 1911 William Heinemann published the poem with illustrations by Charles Robinson.
Bibliography
English Drawings and Watercolours. London: Christie's (5 June 1984): lot 179, 58.
The Nicolette Wernick Collection, British Watercolours and Paintings (1800-1950) . London: Christie's (16 June 2010): lot 39, 27. https://www.christies.com/en/lot/lot-5318366
Old Master, British and European Art. Newbury: Dreweatts (11 February 2025): lot 211, 130-31.
The Sensitive Plant by Percy Bysshe Shelley. Illustrated by Laurence Housman. London: Alpine House, 1898.
Toll, Simon. Frank Dicksee, 1853-1928: His Art and Life. Woodbridge, Suffolk: ACC Art Books, 2016, cat. no. FD.1887.7, 73 & 229.
Created 9 July 2026