![](https://www.tate.org.uk/static/images/placeholder/placeholder-4x3.b312143b17e7.gif)
In Tate Britain
- Artist
- Henry Robert Morland 1716–1797
- Medium
- Oil paint on canvas
- Dimensions
- Support: 743 × 616 mm
frame: 942 × 817 × 92 mm - Collection
- Tate
- Acquisition
- Purchased 1894
- Reference
- N01403
Display caption
This painting of a maid ironing is typical for Morland, who specialised in such ‘fancy pictures’ - subjects drawn from everyday life but with imaginative elements. He repeatedly painted and exhibited idealised pictures of young women in working-class roles, as ballad singers, oyster sellers and laundry maids. Here, the woman is shown passively gazing down, serene as she works, her tools and appearance pristine. There is little indication of her individuality, or of the real hardship of such domestic labour. Instead, she represents a contrived ‘type’, made attractive for contemporary middle and upper-class viewers and saleable for the print market.
Gallery label, June 2022
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