Gerald Moira

Washing Day

exhibited 1938

Not on display

Artist: Gerald Moira 1867–1959
Medium: Watercolour and graphite on paper
Dimensions: Support: 387 × 559 mm
Collection: Tate
Acquisition: Presented by the Trustees of the Chantrey Bequest 1938
Reference: N04966

Display caption

These two laundry girls are marking linen with coloured thread to distinguish the items for return to owners. Rutherston liked to choose subjects from daily life. Despite the painting’s appearance of authenticity, it was staged in his studio using props to create the scene. The models actually sold fruit and vegetables and had also sat for the painter Walter Sickert. There is no sense of the energetic activity of real work. The women are presented working contentedly in a way that was unproblematic for the middle-class viewer.

Gallery label, October 2020

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Catalogue entry

N04966 WASHING DAY c. 1938

Inscr. ‘GM’ b.r.
Pencil and watercolour, 15 1/4×22 (39×56).
Chantrey Purchase from the artist 1938.
Exh: R.A., 1938 (978).

[no further details]

Published in:
Mary Chamot, Dennis Farr and Martin Butlin, The Modern British Paintings, Drawings and Sculpture, London 1964, II