Steps in a Garden
Medium
watercolor and gouache with scratch-away technique to create highlights on sturdy-weight wove paper mounted to same by artist with color tests in margins of mount
Dimensions
sheet: 33.8 × 26 cm · secondary support: 39 × 32.4 cm
Classification
Drawing
Department
Drawings
Museum
Cleveland Museum of Art
Credit
Gift in memory of Helen Borowitz
Accession Number
2013.240
Tags
About this artwork
William Henry Millais was closely associated with the founding members of the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood. He sketched extensively from nature in the early 1850s. Here, Millais painted a sequestered landscape of rough-hewn steps ascending a shady slope. A smattering of light pierces a dense canopy of trees, allowing little to flourish except for the foxgloves that adorn the foreground. Ivy growing on the hillside, a decaying stump, and moss-covered steps suggest the passage of time.