Artware Fineart has dated this Victorian Oil Portrait Painting to the 19th Century.
My First Sermon
oil on panel
28 x 20 cm. (11 x 8 in.)
At this time, Millais was at the top of his powers in terms of technical skill and physical strength, and the force and speed of his execution were amazing on this painting.
Millais was very fond of children, particularly his own. He often used his daughter Effie as his model. The artist had already painted children; for instance, in The Woodsman's Daughter (executed in 1850-1851), but My First Sermon marks the beginning of several popular ones in which a child is seen as the centre of attention. The painting made its mark by showing this young girl in her red cloak and trim, soft furry muff, as well as a good bright splash of colour in a dim church and her short legs in the red stockings, supported for the child, seriously concentrating on the sermon.
In the painting, the poignancy typically comes from guessing it's all over her head. There is also a touch of humour, which will be more clear in My Second Sermon, which is its later companion piece when the child has stopped trying to concentrate and is seen sleeping. Other examples of pictures of the artist's affectionate dwelling on one kid subject include Bubbles (1865-1866) and Little Speedwell's Darling Blue (1891-1892).
The painting was very popular. Millais was proud of the picture that before going North that year, he produced an oil copy of the painting, taking two days (morning to night) to complete; the artist didn't even breaking off to take lunch. He executed it quickly and perfectly. This was a great achievement since the copy displayed nearly similar high finish as the first painting. As soon as the copy was finished, it was sold and the artist received £180. The artist's mastery of expression is more evident in this painting. In the face of the child, Millais' unique power of seizing the look of inward consciousness and the soul lighting the features is seen in its full purity in children's sweet faces of children.
My First Sermon was exhibited in 1863 at the Royal Academy, and at the Academy banquet on 3 May the Archbishop of Canterbury is reported to have said, "Art has, and ever will have, a high and noble mission to fulfil.... we feel ourselves the better and the happier when our hearts are enlarged as we sympathise with the joys and the sorrows of our fellow-men, faithfully delineated on the canvas; when our spirits are touched by the playfulness, the innocence, the purity, and may I not add (pointing to Millais' picture of My First Sermon) the piety of childhood (qtd. in Millais 378). Millais' son and first biographer continues:
This little picture of Effie was extremely popular. The artist himself was so pleased with it that, before going North in August of that year, he made an oil copy of it, doing the work from start to finish in two days! A truly marvellous achievement, considering that the copy displayed almost the same high finish as the original; but in those two days he worked incessantly from morning to night, never even breaking off for lunch in the middle of the day. Well might he say, as he did in a letter to my mother, "I never did anything in my life so well or so quickly." The copy was sold as soon as it was finished, and I see from an entry in my mother's book that he received £180 for it.
John Guille Millais adds in a footnote that the pictures were painted in the old church at Kingston-on-Thames, were Millais' parents lived, before the "old highbacked pews" had been removed." He continues by explaining that his father "was now, so far as I can judge, at the summit of his powers in point of both physical strength and technical sk
Artware Fineart has dated this Victorian Oil Portrait Painting to the 19th Century.
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Studio of Sir John Everett Millais , Bt Pra, (1829-96) My First Sermon oil on Panel 28 X 20 Cm. (11 X 8 In.)
