Opaque glass mosaic, designed by William Blake Richmond, executed by Messrs Powell of Whitefriars, completed by 1896
Adam and Eve open the series of mosaics along the run of the entablature of the quire. According to Forrest Browne, Richmond initially considered using these flat, rectangular spaces for mosaics depicting a procession of saints and angels, “but the scale was too small and the idea was finally abandoned.” As a result, the mosaics of the entablature are among the most daring and successful of Richmond’s scheme: they celebrate the theme of the Creation, so boldly laid out in the saucer domes, further. Eve is depicted here with tigers and birds, quite possibly following William Blake’s early nineteenth-century painting of this name which is also the pendant of a painting Adam Naming the Beasts.
Brief description: rectangular mosaic depicting Eve in the nude seated between two tigers, whom she caresses, her long flaming red hair open and blending in with the background of scrolling foliage in red and black colours; the composition is flanked by two peacocks, and a third bird with lyre-shaped tail is depicted on the back of the left tiger; a frieze of classical meander an wave running along the base of the mosaic.
Related quotes:
Genesis 2:22-23: “And the rib that the Lord God had taken from the man he made into a woman and brought her to the man. Then the man said, “This at last is bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh; this one shall be called Woman, for out of Man this one was taken.”(NRSV)
Browne 1896, p. 18: “The great rectangular panels above the organ, corresponding to those in the original sanctuary bay which represent not very adequately or clearly the sea giving up its dead, are among the finest designs and the most brilliant pieces of work as yet placed in the Choir. On the north side is Adam in Paradise, with a lion and a lioness. The lioness is licking his toe with her tongue. It is permitted to record that the attitude is that of a favourite cat of the artist, who performs this ceremony every morning as he steps out of the bath. On the south is Eve, with magnificent tigers; accompanied by peacocks, and a lyre bird in full song.”
Related work elsewhere: William Blake, Eve Naming the Birds, tempera/canvas, c.1810, Glasgow Museums (Pollock Country Park; also a pendant to Adam Naming the Beasts)
Literature and references: Browne 1896, p. 18; Zech 2015, pp. 26-27, front flap ill.
