Five Poor Children in School

Antonio Piccinni 1846 - 1920

Summary

A group of five children sat a school desk. Four of the children are facing to the right. The fifth child, at the back of the group, is facing the viewer. One of the children is leaning forward on the desk with her head supported on her left hand. There are three bags hanging on pegs in the upper background. Most of the children wear head scarfs and shawls with long skirts. The child nearest the viewer has a large hole in the sleeve of her blouse. This etching was one of a collection formed by print expert PG Hamerton (1834-94) for the Manchester Art Museum, an educational gallery which opened in 1886 in the industrial suburb of Ancoats. The collection was transferred to the City Art Gallery in 1912, the Art Museum maintaining that they did not have enough space to display it. On acquisition, the prints were displayed together, with a catalogue of the pithy comments on each print that Hamerton had made in 1882. For this work, he had noted, 'Roman children, I suppose. The faces are all good studies of various expressions, especially that of the boy with its half-careless look.'