Juliet

Charles Robert Leslie was a painter of literary and historical genre. He exhibited at the Royal Academy and British Institution, and acted as Professor of the Royal Academy Schools from 1847-52. Leslie was a key cultural figure in many respects. He was a great friend of John Constable, and their correspondence constitutes an important archival resource. He painted works for Queen Victoria including The Christening of the Princess Royal. Charles Robert's son, George Dunlop Leslie (1835-1921), was also a painter and to some degree his elegant genre works uphold his father's legacy.

Here Charles Robert Leslie depicts Juliet examining the phial of poison that will be her chosen means of death. The composition holds no hint of the melodrama sometimes attendant upon visual renditions of the final moments of Shakespeare's 'star-crossed lovers', Romeo and Juliet. Juliet fondles the small bottle with something akin to curiosity; she seems deeply absorbed in thought. The drama is inherent in the single light source, which illuminates the young girl's face and pink dress - an effect as dramatic as any in the work of French baroque painter Georges De La Tour (1593-1652).

An almost identical composition to the present picture, entitled 'The Present', is in the Harris Museum and Art Gallery, Preston.