Diary of a Duchess was inspired by the book Duchess
by Sarah Holloway Scott about Sarah Churchill. It is about the life of
the Duchess in the 1600s. She began her life as the poor daughter of a
seamstress and moved up to royal level and assistant to Queen Anne. Each
stripe or section of color in the painting represents a line in the
Duchess' imaginary diary explaining the weather, the materials with
which her new home was made, the fabrics of her dresses. Her attire and
the ballroom where she met the love of her life also took part in this
piece. It was all precious and new to her. It begins with the wood
section on the left of the canvas. The "wood" can be considered a
polished floor or a part of her poorer existance. The blue lines
represent the days she wrote of walks outside with her lover under blue
skies and green grasses. Red representing servitude to royalty as well
as her mixed feelings of anguish and enjoyment in doing so. The patterns
of the time seem to be drifting from the present back into the past and
tell the story of how her life changed that one day in the ballroom of
the palace where she met John Churchill. The story continues with a life
with John under blue skies and then carrying his memory with her after
his death off into the sunset.
Diary of a Duchess was inspired by the book Duchess
by Sarah Holloway Scott about Sarah Churchill. It is about the life of
the Duchess in the 1600s. She began her life as the poor daughter of a
seamstress and moved up to royal level and assistant to Queen Anne. Each
stripe or section of color in the painting represents a line in the
Duchess' imaginary diary explaining the weather, the materials with
which her new home was made, the fabrics of her dresses. Her attire and
the ballroom where she met the love of her life also took part in this
piece. It was all precious and new to her. It begins with the wood
section on the left of the canvas. The "wood" can be considered a
polished floor or a part of her poorer existance. The blue lines
represent the days she wrote of walks outside with her lover under blue
skies and green grasses. Red representing servitude to royalty as well
as her mixed feelings of anguish and enjoyment in doing so. The patterns
of the time seem to be drifting from the present back into the past and
tell the story of how her life changed that one day in the ballroom of
the palace where she met John Churchill. The story continues with a life
with John under blue skies and then carrying his memory with her after
his death off into the sunset. 