Hope
1891 · Oil on panel · Yale Center for British Art, New Haven
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About this work
- Artist
- George Frederic Watts (1817–1904)
- Year
- 1891
- Medium
- Oil on panel
- Original size
- 66 × 48.3 cm
- Collection
- Yale Center for British Art, New Haven
- Movement
- Symbolism
A blindfolded young woman in grey-green drapery sits hunched on a dull orange globe, bent over a lyre with one string left. A faint rainbow rings her, and a single tiny star shows at the top of the blue background. Watts finished the first two versions in 1886 and painted later ones for private buyers; in this one he added the rainbow to soften the bleakness, and it stayed with the family of its first owner, Richard Budgett, until 1997. A 1990 sermon on the painting moved the young Barack Obama, who took The Audacity of Hope as a theme. It is in the Yale Center for British Art.
This full-bleed edition prints the work edge to edge from a high-resolution scan of the original, very slightly cropped (a few percent at most) to fit the sheet. The gallery edition shows the whole work, uncropped. The original is in the public domain.
Where it works
Misty blues, grey-green and a dull orange globe suit a bedroom, study or reading corner on a soft blue or warm grey wall. Pair it with Burne-Jones's The Golden Stairs, hung at 16×24 in a dark wood frame.
Style, size & framing detail
- Style
- Symbolism painting
- Era
- 19th century (1891)
- Orientation
- Portrait
- Mood
- grand
- Rooms
- bedroom, study or library, living room, dining room
- Good gift for
- housewarming, art lovers
Size. We'd hang this one at 16×24. Prints at 12×18, 16×24 in — 12×18 for a shelf, desk or a gallery-wall grid; 16×24 above a desk, console or in a hallway.
Framing. Printed edge to edge: a slim black or dark wood frame right to the image, or let the canvas wrap do the framing. Also available gallery-wrapped on canvas, ready to hang with no frame.
Pairing. Pairs as a set of three with other famous painting prints (10% off three or more).
Details & materials
Shipping & returns
Is this the whole painting, or a crop?
Is Hope in the public domain?
What is it printed on?
When was Hope painted, and in what medium?
What size works above a sofa or bed?
About this design
The Madten promise
An exhibition poster
The same artwork as a gallery exhibition poster — title, artist & date typeset beneath the image on a soft ground.
A fine-art print
The same artwork as a clean fine-art print — the image shown large with a minimal caption.






















