British artist Albert Joseph Moore takes his subject from the Song of Deborah in Judges 5 of the Christian bible, where Sisera’s mother waits at the window and cries through the lattice, “Why is his chariot so long in coming?” The story’s outcome is grim because Sisera has been killed by Jael, yet the painting lingers on the suspended moment before certainty arrives. What we see is the labor of waiting with attention sharpened into worry and hope pressed against dread. The model is Fanny Eaton, a Jamaican-born woman who posed for artists in the Pre-Raphaelite circle, placing a Black muse at the center of a Victorian “biblical” image and complicating ideas of who embodies sacred history. It’s a close view of a woman at a window, shown from the chest up in right-facing profile. Her deep brown skin is modeled with soft, naturalistic light as a warm highlight traces her forehead, cheekbone, nose, and the edge of her lower lip, while the far side of her face dissolves into shadow. Her dark hair is smoothed back and gathered behind. She wears a pale, loosely draped garment that slips open at the throat, and a dense, collar-like necklace of clustered beads that sits heavy on her shoulders. The woman leans forward, intent. One hand rises to a wooden window frame with her fingertips hovering near a narrow grid-like lattice, as if she is about to part it or is listening through it. Behind her, the space is quiet and dark, in reddish-brown and umber tones that keep attention on her face and gesture. Her expression is both alert and strained with eyes wide, brow slightly lifted, mouth gently set, as though she is holding her breath while watching the road. Painted early in Moore’s Royal Academy career, the work shows his early gift for restrained drama, precise observation, and harmonized color. It entered Tullie House through the 1949 bequest of Emily and Gordon Bottomley, and it still reads as a tender study of maternal vigilance.

“The Mother of Sisera” by Albert Joseph Moore (British) - Oil on canvas / 1861 - Tullie House Museum and Art Gallery (Carlisle, England) #WomenInArt #art #artText #artwork #AlbertJosephMoore #TullieHouse #VictorianArt #BiblicalArt #BritishArt #OilPainting #BlueskyArt #BritishArtist #PortraitofaWoman

Painted in 1937, on the eve of the Second World War, this self-portrait places Peggy Fitzgerald among the many interwar women artists who used their own image to claim professional visibility. Working within a crisp, representational style typical of 1930s British realism, she presents herself neither as muse nor ornament but as a thoughtful, modern painter, framed by her own art. The young white woman is shown from the chest up, turned slightly left but looking at us head-on. Her dark, tightly curled hair frames a pale, oval face with steady brown eyes and full red lips, set against a flat olive-green wall. She wears a close-fitting taupe top with narrow red-and-blue stripes edging the collar and running in a band down the front. In her right hand, raised to chest height, she holds a thin stem with a few glossy green leaves. A gold ring with a dark rectangular stone glints on her pinky finger. Behind her, cropped by the picture edge, hang two framed works: a color painting on the left and, on the right, a small print with hazy figures and faint lettering. The light falls evenly, modeling her features with careful, almost sculptural precision. The branch she holds can be read as a quiet emblem of growth and persistence, a living accent in an otherwise controlled interior. Almost nothing is known about Fitzgerald beyond brief records that list her as a British artist active in the 1930s and 1940s, with works such as “Sea Thoughts” exhibited or sold in the same period. Today, this canvas is believed to be her only oil painting in a UK public collection, making it a rare witness to a career largely missing from the written record and a reminder of how many women’s artistic lives survive chiefly through a single, resolute self-portrait.

“Self Portrait” by Peggy Fitzgerald (British) - Oil on canvas / 1937 - Tullie House Museum and Art Gallery (Carlisle, England) #WomenInArt #PeggyFitzgerald #TullieHouse #SelfPortrait #SelfPortrait #artText #art #BlueskyArt #WomensArt #WomanArtist #WomenArtists #bskyart #TullieHouseMuseum #BritishArt

3d prints of viking artefacts including a sword, axehead, and shield boss

3d prints of two viking oval brooches, one of which has been painted green

Starting on some exciting new work today! #3dprinting #vikings @archaeoptics.bsky.social #tulliehouse