'Girl with Blue Butterflies', Frances MacDonald

Pencil and watercolour
s. and d.r.: ‘FRANCES E. / MACDONALD / 1898’
45.3 x 101.8 (17 7/8 x 40 1/8)
Donald and Eleanor Taffner, New York

This ambitious watercolour has previously been titled ‘Ophelia’ but there is little sense of that heroine’s tragic death by drowning.

The subject’s youth and the flowery, butterfly-filled setting suggest rather a celebration of innocence and/or Spring.