The Singer

Arthur Hughes exhibited 'The Singer' at the Royal Academy in 1866, and it now belongs to Tate's collection. The subject of a woman singing, accompanied or unaccompanied, was common in Victorian painting, functioning simultaneously as a demonstration of feminine accomplishment and as a meditation on the relationship between emotion, voice, and artistic expression. For the Pre-Raphaelite painters and their associates, music carried quasi-mystical significance as the most immediate medium for emotional communication, and the singing or playing woman was a recurring figure from Rossetti's musical subjects through to Hughes's own treatment here. The panel support, which Hughes used frequently for his more intimate and carefully executed works, provides the smooth surface suited to the delicate treatment of the singer's face and the fine detail of any musical accompaniment or decorative setting. Tate holds this as part of its Pre-Raphaelite and Victorian collection.

The panel support of 'The Singer' allows for precise linear work in the figure and face, where the act of singing requires careful observation of the open mouth, the engaged throat, and the expression of absorbed musical concentration. Hughes's characteristic attention to decorative detail — the singer's costume, her surrounding environment — is deployed here in service of an intimate psychological subject.