The Leisure Hour - Portrait of the Artist's Wife Gertrude reading 1917

The Leisure Hour - Portrait of the Artist's Wife Gertrude reading 1917 is not in the 2001 book about Harold Harvey and is in fact for sale at Richard Green, which compares it with Hammershoi ('although this comfortable scene has none of Hammershoi's melancholy'). But looking at it, and the other Harvey paintings on this week's Post, makes one think first of Vermeer. (Someone wrote to Dorothy Whipple once comparing her at length to Vermeer, and whether or not this is justified, certainly each Harold Harvey painting could have inspired a Dorothy Whipple novel or short story.) An hour of 'leisure' (nicely old-fashioned word). A dress in Persephone grey! A comfortable chair with a cushion for her head. Yellow walls. White flowers (?roses). The only flicker of unease comes from the painting's date - right in the middle of WW1 - and for this reason most modern viewers would imbue it with a touch of melancholy.