Original artwork for Carols: "Good King Wenceslas".

1925. Original artwork for the Christmas carol Published within a collection of Carols in 1925 by the firm of Alexander Moring. The printed volume presented 14 carols with 6 double-page colour plates and 5 other colour plates by Brickdale. This fine watercolour was reproduced as one of the double-page plates. Eleanor Fortescue Brickdale (1871-1945) is remembered as a painter and designer. As noted by Simon Houfe, "she represents the last phase of Pre-Raphaelitism, her highly detailed and meaningful little pictures are crammed with medievalism and moral sentiment. She was the ideal illustrator of legend and particularly for those expensive coloured gift books of the 1900s where her bright colours and haughty figures were set off to advantage on the ample pages" (Houfe, p. 73). Original drawing (235 x 316 mm) on artist's board (252 x 335 mm with "Smith's Water Color Boards" printed on reverse), fine ink and watercolour, signed ("E. F. Brickdale") lower right, mounted, framed, and glazed (framed size 387 x 456 mm). Fine condition: bright and unfaded. Simon Houfe, 19th Century British Book Illustrators and Caricaturists, 1998.