Suburban prospects: vision and possession in Ford Madox Brown's An English Autumn Afternoon *

In the autumn of 1852, just three months after his move to the London suburb of Hampstead, Ford Madox Brown started work on An English Autumn Afternoon a painting that ranks as one of his finest achievements. There is much in An English Autumn Afternoon to confirm the interest suggested by Brown's commentary. The young couple, dressed fashionably in middle-class attire which signals the social and cultural particularity of the represented scene, are shown to have ignored the nearby bench in favour of a blanket spread on the grass; the woman has abandoned her bonnet and shawl, and holds the man's left hand as he gestures towards the view with his right. In 1852 and 1853, as Brown looked out from his landlady's window, this controversy centred on East Heath precisely the area of the Heath visible beyond the gardens in the middle-ground of An English Autumn Afternoon.