Thursday 26 April 2007

Harry R Mileham



Most of his works are known to at least one of "us cousins", so when we see his sketches, designs and life drawings we usually have a good idea what it was all about. I will start with one which is a mystery. One of his best works, The Pardoner’s Prologue, would seem to be a good candidate for this sketch on paper but there is no evidence and some family disagreement about it.

Bridgman have a better picture of The Pardoners Prologue. The detail in this painting is extraordinary. Helen Cooper's article on this work will I hope be available on line when permission is granted.
Bridgman entry is here;

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

I like this sketch... Wish we could see a bigger picture of the oil.

Here's a little American poem on the maker of the Pardoner:

Chaucer

An old man in a lodge within a park;
The chamber walls depicted all around
With portraitures of huntsman, hawk, and hound,
And the hurt deer. He listeneth to the lark,
Whose song comes with the sunshine through the dark
Of painted glass in leaden lattice bound;
He listeneth and he laugheth at the sound,
Then writeth in a book like any clerk.
He is the poet of the dawn, who wrote
The Canterbury Tales, and his old age
Made beautiful with song; and as I read
I hear the crowing cock, I hear the note
Of lark and linnet, and from every page
Rise odors of ploughed field or flowery mead.

That's Longfellow...