The Signal

The Signal, painted in 1899 and now in the J. Paul Getty Museum, features a woman with a handkerchief or cloth raised in the gesture of signalling — a motif with ancient roots in scenes of departure and return, from the Odyssey's watchful Penelope to Virgilian imagery of coastal farewells. Godward transforms a potentially narrative subject into something more purely visual: the raised arm creates a diagonal accent in the composition, the wind-caught fabric adds movement to his characteristically still genre scenes, and the coastal setting introduces a horizon line and open space unusual in his often close-framed compositions. The Getty's acquisition of this work secured it as one of the best-documented examples of Godward's late Victorian style, enabling close physical examination that has confirmed his layered glazing technique and his preparation of marble surfaces over a consistently warm off-white ground.

The unusual compositional device of a raised arm and wind-blown fabric demanded that Godward address movement, something his predominantly static genre scenes did not normally require. He renders the wind-caught fabric with animated fold patterns — convex billowing shapes rather than the gravity-pulled drapes of his interiors — and positions the raised arm to create a strong diagonal accent that animates the overall composition.