Lot 2023: ATTRIBUTED TO JOHN WHITE ALEXANDER (AMERICAN

ATTRIBUTED TO JOHN WHITE ALEXANDER (AMERICAN 1856-1915) Study for Isabella And The Pot Of Basil Oil on board 40.5 x 20 cm (16 x 8 inches) Note : Isabella, or the Pot of Basil (1818) is a narrative poem by John Keats adapted from a story in Boccaccio's Decameron (IV, 5). It tells the tale of a young woman whose family intend to marry her to "some high noble and his olive trees" but who falls for Lorenzo-one of her brothers' employees. When the brothers learn of this they murder Lorenzo and bury his body. His ghost informs Isabella in a dream. She exhumes the body and buries the head in a pot of basil which she tends obsessively while pining away. The poem inspired notable works by William Holman Hunt; John Millais; John Waterhouse; John White Alexander and others. This lot is believed to be a preparatory work for the painting by Alexander which is included in the collection of The Museum of Fine Arts in Boston USA.