The Return of the Runaway, by Joseph Clark (1834-1926). c.1862. Oil on canvas. H 46 x W 61.4 cm. Collection and image credit: Laing Art Gallery, Newcastle Upon Tyne. Accession no. TWCMS : B8137. Given by Miss Wilson, 1940. Downloaded courtesy of the Laing, via Art UK, for purposes of academic research.
James Dafforne writes,
Some years have passed since that stalwart sailor went adrift from his father’s home; but he had an inkling for the sea when a boy, for there is a rudely-built ship on the mantel-piece, doubtless his handiwork, and a tattered print of a launch, which probably belonged to him, hangs on the wall. But he has been absent so long his parents cannot recognise him, though the keen, scrutinising look of the mother, aided, perhaps, by his voice, seems as if it more than half detected in the stranger the person of her son: a few minutes more and the discovery will made. Here, again, we have one of those unpretentious subjects, treated with consummate skill and tact, which makes its own appeal to our acknowledgment of truth of Art. [51]
It is worth adding that while the man reading his newspaper in the corner might well be the runaway's father, the bent, bonneted and grey-haired woman here looks more like his grandmother. Certainly, she is unlikely to be the mother of the prettily dressed little girl in the painting, keeping close to her apron (probably holding it) and hugging her picture-book to her.
Left: Watercolour sketch for the finished painting. Right: The engraving of the work in Dafforne's article about Clark.
One of Clark's subtleties is that the many details in his works require the viewer's interpretation; another is the untold tale at which the composition hints. If the elderly lady is his grandmother, is the child one that he left behind, or perhaps the orphan of a sister who has since passed away? The family might have endured other sorrows besides the one he had inflicted on them. But such sorrows have also, it seems, been mitigated by this new little mite, growing up nicely in their midst, and now looking at the stranger so uncomprehendingly. The family has drawn together in his absence. He may be greeted joyfully: men's misdemeanours were more easily forgiven than women's. But what will happen now? What does the future hold, for all concerned? Hanging on the wall by the mantelpiece is something that looks very like a pair of scissors. — Jacqueline Banerjee
Bibliography
Dafforne, James. "British Artists: Their Style and Character, No. LXIII: Joseph Clark." The Art-Journal Vol. 2, issue 15 (March 1863): 49-51. Internet Archive. [Whole text on the Victorian Web]
The Return of the Runaway. Art UK (see also laingartgallery.org.uk). Web. 20 November 2024.
Created 20 November 2024