Sky Eclat
JF-Expert Member
- Oct 17, 2012
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Queen Victoria with her arm on the future King Edward VII. A typically beautiful Winterhalter work - if you look to the left you’ll see Prince Alfred (future Duke of Edinburgh) dressed in feminine or, perhaps more accurately, gender-neutral clothing that was then used for most male infants.
The three princesses next to their German father, Prince Albert, are Princess Alice (later mother to Russia’s last tsarina, Alexandra), the future Princess Helena of Schleswig-Holstein, and Victoria, subsequently Britain’s Princess Royal, Germany’s empress, and Kaiser Wilhelm II’s mother.
After the heavy-drinking, promiscuous womanising, and reckless spending of Queen Victoria’s uncles, the new British Royal Family were determined to present an image of themselves as a united, nuclear, Christian family - and paintings like this played a part in conveying that to people.
The three princesses next to their German father, Prince Albert, are Princess Alice (later mother to Russia’s last tsarina, Alexandra), the future Princess Helena of Schleswig-Holstein, and Victoria, subsequently Britain’s Princess Royal, Germany’s empress, and Kaiser Wilhelm II’s mother.
After the heavy-drinking, promiscuous womanising, and reckless spending of Queen Victoria’s uncles, the new British Royal Family were determined to present an image of themselves as a united, nuclear, Christian family - and paintings like this played a part in conveying that to people.