William Butler Yeats 1898

Curator: Sarah Purser created this striking drawing of William Butler Yeats in 1898. Editor: It’s a very soft and suggestive work, almost hesitant in its lines. The muted colors add to the sense of thoughtful introspection. Curator: Absolutely. Purser was deeply embedded in the Arts and Crafts Movement, which often looked back to a romanticized version of the past. Think about what Yeats represents to Ireland: a poet of national identity and mythical worlds. She captures his intense spirit. Notice how he's centered, posed almost like a religious icon. Editor: You can see this in her construction. She employs short, almost frenetic marks around Yeats’ figure to define form through tonal value, contrasting against the solid areas defining his coat. She has these light pastel scribbles emerging from his hair and shoulder...almost like emanating light! Curator: A halo, of sorts, signaling Yeats' spiritual and creative aura. His dark hair and coat contrast sharply with his pale skin, enhancing this sense of ethereality. Look at the intensity of his gaze, the eyes drawing you in. It is no surprise she elected to place them so high in the pictorial field, lending them immediate dominance. Editor: It almost feels like an unfinished work. There is an ambiguous quality to the piece because of these rough lines that creates a liminal state, inviting the viewer to partake. This is, perhaps, the point? His legacy was then just beginning to take hold of a nascent, nationalist Ireland, still unrealized, yet coming quickly into view. Curator: I see it less as unfinished and more as indicative of an identity still in progress, always under construction and reimagining the old sagas for the modern age. Thank you, that helped me think more about what constitutes a symbol for an evolving culture. Editor: And for me, to appreciate how line can represent something on the precipice, ready to break, yet also in process of being made!