Footnotes

Provenance
Anon. sale, Sotheby's, London, 6 November 1996, lot 325.
Private collection, UK.

Exhibited
London, Royal Academy, 1888, no. 583.

Literature
Art Journal, 1888, p. 128.
H. Blackburn (ed.), Academy Notes, 1888, pp. 12 and 77 (sketch illustrated).
The Graphic, vol. 38, July-December 1888, illustrated.
Alfred Lys Baldry, The Paintings of S. Melton Fisher in The Studio, vol. 42, 1908, pp. 176-181.
Christopher Wood, The Dictionary of Victorian Painters, Woodbridge, 1995, p. 171.

'The subjects he chose were characteristic of modern Venetian life; his canvases were records of his observation of the people among whom he found himself, and by their brilliant reality and clever statements of picturesque facts gained the approval of everyone who was qualified to judge his work'
(Alfred Lys Baldry, The Studio, 1908)

Fisher studied at the Lambeth School of Art and Royal Academy Schools between 1876 and 1881, winning a gold medal and a travelling scholarship; travelling to Paris, he studied with Jules Bonnaffé. His work In Realms of Fancy was purchased by the Chantrey Bequest in 1898 and later in his life he returned to portrait and figure painting, possibly for financial reasons.

Venice in the late 1800s was a popular destination for many artists; alongside Fisher were artists such as John Singer Sargent, James Abbott McNeill Whistler, Henry Woods and William Logsdail. The unusual beauty and uniqueness of the city was enchanting and for many artists, Venice was restorative and transformative for their practice. Artists in Venice would often focus either on the working-class Venetians engaged in daily activities, which provided a wealth of subject matter, or the complex play of light on the water, architecture and canal views or narrow streets. In the present lot Fisher has chosen to depict a group of women at work making costumes presumably in preparation for a festival. This subject provides the artist with a perfect opportunity to celebrate the light and shade in the room and the rich texture of the materials. The square brushwork is testament to the influence of Bastein Lepage and his British counterparts, in particular Stanhope Forbes and Albert Chevallier Tayler who had travelled to Venice the year before and had first met Fisher in Paris in 1881.