Crossing the Ford

Crossing the Ford
Artist	William Mulready
Year	1842
Type	Oil on mahogany, genre painting
Dimensions	60.6 cm× 50.2 cm(23.9 in× 19.8 in)
Location	Tate Britain, London

Crossing the Ford is an 1842 genre painting by the Irish-born artist William Mulready. ^{[1] [2]} It depicts two young men carrying woman across a ford somewhere in rural England and suggests she is choosing which of the two suitors to make a future with. The painting was displayed at the Royal Academy's Summer Exhibition of 1842 at the National Gallery in Trafalgar Square where it was one of the most popular works on display. Today it is in the collection of the Tate Britain in Pimlico, having been given to the nation by the art collector Robert Vernon in 1847, who had bought the work from the artist for 600 guineas. ^[3]

References

1. Wright, Gordon & Smith p.589
2. Mitchell p.516
3. Tate Britain

Bibliography

• Mitchell, Sally (ed.) Victorian Britain: An Encyclopedia. Routledge, 2011.
• Rorimer, Anne. Drawings by William Mulready. Victoria and Albert Museum, 1972.
• Wright, Christopher, Gordon, Catherine May & Smith, Mary Peskett. British and Irish Paintings in Public Collections: An Index of British and Irish Oil Paintings by Artists Born Before 1870 in Public and Institutional Collections in the United Kingdom and Ireland. Yale University Press, 2006.