I travelled to see The Dog-Rose (La Zarzarrosa) by Glyn Warren Philpot at the Cambridge Fitzwilliam Museum in England. Come join me there too. Welcome to Art, Culture & Travel with me, Anthony King.
Glyn Warren Philpot was born in 1884 and this oil on canvas was painted in 1910 – 11. The museum tell us: “Philpot was known for his elegant society portraits, but this painting shows him exploring glamour, camp and queerness through a trio of models he met while travelling in Spain. Attention is lavished on the textures and exquisite details of the woman’s dress, and her magnetic presence celebrates her elaborate, exaggerated style. The boyish figure behind her does not resemble a husband or lover, and is framed rather as a companion, a co-conspirator. A woman in garish make-up looms out of the darkness, and alludes to contemporary ideas about artifice, gender and embodiment that the work of queer aesthetes like Philpot anticipated”.
By Anthony King (c)