Fanny Eaton commemoration

The 93rd anniversary of Fanny Eaton's death on 4 March 1924 was commemorated on Saturday 4 March  2017  at Margravine (Hammersmith) cemetery, London W68RL.

The grave spot is in the South Front section behind Charing Cross Hospital.  A marker has been placed on the plot as indicated in cemetery records, pending the installation of a stone plaque; although burials are all but ended, the cemetery does allow new, small gravestones. 

Mary and Brian Eaton by Fanny's grave 

 

To mark the occasion, below another probable sighting of Fanny in art, as the Widow in Ford Madox Brown's painting of Elijah resurrecting her son (already in his funeral shroud). 
Fanny is not certainly identified as the model here, but given her extensive artistic employment for figures of Middle Eastern appearance, and artists' ideas about historical authenticity,  she is the most likely candidate. 


The earliest version of  Elijah and the Widow's Son was finished in summer 1864; this version was completed by the end of 1868 and shown in Manchester the following year, when the Manchester Guardian critic complained that the 'grave and noble' subject was  ruined by the  'white wool mat' that the prophet had on his head.  However, according to another review,  the 'most perfect figure' was that of the kneeling mother, than which it  was 'hard to conceive anything more impressive than the whole composition or the nobleness of the head'.