'His first suit,' a large Victorian oil painting by Fred Morgan

Titled His first suit, and signed to the lower right 'Fred Morgan,' this excellent and large painting is executed in oil-on-canvas, and set within a carved giltwood frame.

Bearing substantial similarities to Morgan's well-known painting His first birthday, this beautiful work celebrates a similar image of Victorian country-living; a romantic and sentimental, even, celebration of the innocence and purity of childhood and the idyllic nature of an English middle-class family lifestyle.

A number of the models in this work and Morgan's His first birthday are the same, including the elderly couple and Morgan's wife Mary who is the moment shown here kneeling on the floor. The central figure, the young boy wearing his very first suit, is Morgan's son Courtney.

Morgan himself was a celebrated painter of portraits, domestic scenes, and the English countryside, known in particular for these innoncent childhood scenes and moments. His style is similar to that of the Arthur John Elsley, his contemporary whose aid he would sometimes enlist when painting pets and barnyard animals, which he did not take to with the same graceful affinity and talent he had for portraits, as demonstrated here. Childhood themes become fantastically popular in Victorian England, and Morgan became one of England's most talented and celebrated artists working in this romantic niche.

The work shares a number of similarities to 'The Hero of the Hour', another work by Morgan in the Mayfair Gallery collection.

Frame: Height 109cm, width 133cm, depth 8cm
Canvas: Height 92cm, width 116cm, depth 2.5cm.