Terms and conditions of use
The flight of Jane Shore
(c. 1865)
Medium
oil on canvas
Measurements
155.3 × 92.4 cm
Credit Line
National Gallery of Victoria, Melbourne
Gift of A. L. Prinsep, 1934
Gallery location
19th Century European Paintings Gallery
Level 2, NGV International
About this work
As a teenager, Val Prinsep was encouraged to paint by the artist George Frederick Watts, who was a long-standing house guest of Prinsep’s parents. According to Watts, in a letter of 1857, ‘I have … plunged him into the Pre-Raphaelite Styx … I found him loitering on the edge and gave him a good shove, and now his gods are Rossetti, Hunt and Millais’. Jane Shore (d. 1527), the influential mistress of Edward IV, was arrested after Edward’s death by the soldiers of Richard III, and imprisoned in the Tower of London. Prinsep shows her just before her arrest, crouching under a bridge, a hunted figure, her hair and clothes dishevelled, as she hides from the soldiers passing above.
Artwork Details
Accession Number
160-4
Department
International Painting
This digital record has been made available on NGV Collection Online through the generous support of Digitisation Champion Ms Carol Grigor through Metal Manufactures Limited
Subjects (general)
Emotions and Mental States History and Legend Human Figures
Subjects (specific)
bridges (built works) flight (escaping) hair (animal components) mistresses (romantic partners) shawls Shore, Jane soldiers women (female humans)
Movements
Pre-Raphaelite
Provenance
Collection of Captain Henry Hill of Brighton, by 1882; collection of Dr Havely King of Grosvenor Square, London; the artist’s son, Anthony Leyland Prinsep, London; by whom donated to the NGV, 1934.