Page 37 - James Ward - A Lioness with a Heron

PHOTO COURTESY OF THE WITT LIBRARY, LONDON

Fig. 11

Sometime before 1829 Ward also painted Snarling Lioness (Fig. 11),58 an abbreviated variation on
Snyders’ Lioness at Play (formerly attributed to Rubens), which Ward may have seen in the collection
of the Earl of Normanton at Somerley, Hampshire. The Earl had acquired the painting in 1823, and
previously it had belonged to George Watson Taylor, although it is not known whether Ward could
have seen the picture in Taylor’s collection. It is possible that Ward may have painted the picture before
1829, when it was sold at Christie’s. When the picture was offered on the American art market in the
1970s, it was shown to John Rupert Martin, a professor at Princeton University, who pointed out the
existence of a related pencil study, signed and dated 1828, in an American private collection. In this
way Ward’s composition, he cropped the original elongated form of Snyders’ lioness at the hips, shifting
the focus to the animal’s bent left paw. Therefore instead of the sinuous grace and mass illustrated in
Snyder’s painting, Ward’s composition concentrated on the implied action of the lioness, specifically
the ‘batting’ gesture so typical of felines, that, depending on the size and species of the cat, could either
invite play or signal attack.

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