In seeming to open a window into everyday domestic life, Father’s Tea also tells a hidden tale of family connections. Elizabeth Graham was 21 when she exhibited this work at the Royal Scottish Academy exhibition in Edinburgh in 1891. She was then living in Newlyn, Cornwall and under the tutelage of her future brother-in-law, leading Newlyn School painter Frank Bramley. Elizabeth’s younger sister Katharine would marry Bramley later that year. The kneeling girl blowing the coals with bellows is likely their sister Margaret, also recorded at this time as staying with their parents in Newlyn. Elizabeth Graham married Charles Chalmers in 1900 and they became Frank Bramley’s major patrons. Known as Lady Chalmers following her husband’s knighthood in 1918, she painted sporadically but devoted herself more fully to painting after his death in 1924. This work is a recent gift to the Gallery from her granddaughter.

(Leaving for Work, 2 October 2021 – 2 October 2022)