Roman Mother

Roman Mother, painted in 1867, exemplifies Leighton's sustained interest in the women of Rome as living embodiments of classical ideals of beauty and maternal dignity. Throughout his time in Italy and his later visits, Leighton drew and painted Roman women as models for both his mythological compositions and independent genre subjects. The theme of motherhood carried weight in Victorian culture as a moral and social ideal, and Leighton's Roman mother allowed him to address that theme while simultaneously invoking the antiquity and grandeur of Rome — the city understood by educated Victorians as the origin of law, civilisation, and familial piety. The figure type he favoured — strong-featured, serene, and nobly proportioned — reflected the Neo-classical aesthetic that underpinned his work throughout the 1860s. Held at Leighton House, the painting demonstrates the range of his genre production during this highly productive decade, when he was moving between large exhibition pieces, portrait commissions, and more intimate studies of Italian figure types.

The figure is modelled with considerable sculptural solidity, reflecting Leighton's habit of thinking in three dimensions — he was also a practising sculptor. The treatment of fabric in particular shows his attention to the fall of drapery around the body. The colour is warm and harmonious, with the figure emerging from a relatively undifferentiated background that focuses all attention on the mother's face and posture.