''The Blind Girl'' (1856) is a

painting Painting is a Visual arts, visual art, which is characterized by the practice of applying paint, pigment, color or other medium to a solid surface (called "matrix" or "Support (art), support"). The medium is commonly applied to the base with ...

John Everett Millais Sir John Everett Millais, 1st Baronet ( , ; 8 June 1829 – 13 August 1896) was an English painter and illustrator who was one of the founders of the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood. He was a child prodigy who, aged eleven, became the youngest s ...

which depicts two itinerant

beggars Begging (also known in North America as panhandling) is the practice of imploring others to grant a favor, often a gift of money, with little or no expectation of reciprocation. A person doing such is called a beggar or panhandler. Beggars m ...

, presumed to be sisters, one of whom is a blind

musician A musician is someone who Composer, composes, Conducting, conducts, or Performing arts#Performers, performs music. According to the United States Employment Service, "musician" is a general Terminology, term used to designate a person who fol ...

, her

concertina A concertina is a free-reed musical instrument, like the various accordions and the harmonica. It consists of expanding and contracting bellows, with buttons (or keys) usually on both ends, unlike accordion buttons, which are on the front. The ...

on her lap. They are resting by the roadside after a

rainstorm Rain is a form of precipitation where water droplets that have condensed from atmospheric water vapor fall under gravity. Rain is a major component of the water cycle and is responsible for depositing most of the fresh water on the Earth. ...

, before travelling to the town of

Winchelsea Winchelsea () is a town in the county of East Sussex, England, located between the High Weald and the Romney Marsh, approximately south west of Rye and north east of Hastings. The current town, which was founded in 1288, replaced an earli ...

, visible in the background. The painting has been interpreted as an

allegory As a List of narrative techniques, literary device or artistic form, an allegory is a wikt:narrative, narrative or visual representation in which a character, place, or event can be interpreted to represent a meaning with moral or political signi ...

of the senses, contrasting the experiences of the blind and sighted sisters. The former feels the warmth of the

sun The Sun is the star at the centre of the Solar System. It is a massive, nearly perfect sphere of hot plasma, heated to incandescence by nuclear fusion reactions in its core, radiating the energy from its surface mainly as visible light a ...

on her face, and fondles a blade of grass, while the latter shields her eyes from the sun or rain and looks at a

double rainbow A rainbow is an optical phenomenon caused by refraction, internal reflection and dispersion of light in water droplets resulting in a continuous spectrum of light appearing in the sky. The rainbow takes the form of a multicoloured circular ar ...

that has just appeared. Some critics have interpreted the rainbow in Biblical terms, as the sign of God's

covenant Covenant may refer to: Religion * Covenant (religion), a formal alliance or agreement made by God with a religious community or with humanity in general ** Covenant (biblical), in the Hebrew Bible ** Covenant in Mormonism, a sacred agreement b ...

described in

Genesis Genesis may refer to: Religion * Book of Genesis, the first book of the biblical scriptures of both Judaism and Christianity, describing the creation of the Earth and of humankind * Genesis creation narrative, the first several chapters of the Bo ...

9:16. When the painting was first exhibited in 1856 it was pointed out to Millais that in double rainbows the secondary rainbow inverts the order of the colours. Millais had originally painted the colours in the same order in both rainbows. He altered it for scientific accuracy. A tortoiseshell butterfly rests on the blind girl's shawl, implying that she is holding herself extremely still. The sign around her neck is captioned "Pity the Blind".

External links

Birmingham Museums & Art Gallery, ''The Blind Girl''

Notes

{{DEFAULTSORT:Blind Girl, The Paintings by John Everett Millais Collection of Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery 1856 paintings Paintings of children Birds in art Musical instruments in art Cattle in art Horses in art Insects in art Rainbows in art Poverty in painting Disability in the arts Paintings of people with visual impairments Oil on canvas paintings

See also

External links

Notes