In May 1865 Cameron used her sister’s London home, Little Holland House, as her photographic headquarters. Her sister Sara Prinsep, together with her husband Thoby, had established a cultural salon there, centred around the artist George Frederic Watts. Cameron photographed numerous members of their circle on the lawn. These included artists, writers, collectors and Henry Cole, the director of the South Kensington Museum.
Here Lady Talbot appears not as herself, but as Melancholy, the personification of pensive sadness that John Milton evoked in his poem ‘Il Penseroso’. Draped in a shawl that hides her everyday clothing, she holds her hands in a dramatic gesture. Cameron inscribed this print with two lines from the poem, ‘Come pensive Nun, devout and pure, / Sober, stedfast, and demure’.
Image restoration by me.
by coonstaantiin