Study of female head for The Cadence of Autumn 1905

Evelyn De Morgan made this study of a female head for The Cadence of Autumn with chalk and graphite on brown paper. I love the way De Morgan builds the form with subtle, almost imperceptible marks, a kind of building-up process that mirrors how we come to understand something deeply over time. The brown paper showing through gives everything a warm, earthy glow. There's a real gentleness to the treatment of the face; look at the soft shadows around the eyes and mouth, and the way the light catches the bridge of the nose. And those graphite strokes in the hair; they remind me of those quick sketches you do when you're trying to capture a fleeting thought. It has the effect of feeling very lifelike, as if she might look up any moment. De Morgan, like her pre-Raphaelite contemporaries, was interested in art as a constant conversation with the past, maybe in this case echoing the Renaissance masters. There’s no single way to read it - it's an invitation to look and feel.