Past and Present, No. 2
- Artist: Augustus Leopold Egg
- Date: 1858
- Medium: Oil paint on canvas
- Dimensions: support: 635 x 762 mm
- Museum: Tate Britain
- Collection record: Tate Britain website
Listen to the free audio guide
About this artwork
This is the “Past and Present, No. 2” by Augustus Leopold Egg, painted in 1858. It sits in the centre of a small triptych that Egg used to expose the harsh social rules of Victorian Britain. In this scene, a wife kneels before her husband, begging for forgiveness. He holds a letter that reveals her affair, and he presses a portrait miniature of her lover onto the page with a stamp – a dramatic gesture that tells the whole story at a glance. Behind them, their two children watch in a mixture of shock and pity. The room is cluttered with symbolic objects – a half‑sliced apple on the table, a mirror reflecting the tense atmosphere, and a small, worn pillow – all hinting at the family’s impending downfall.
Egg’s brushwork is meticulous and his use of light sharp, drawing the eye to the couple’s strained faces while the muted background suggests a quiet domestic interior. The painting is a moralist statement: a man could take a mistress without consequence, but a woman’s infidelity was a crime, a theme Egg never shied away from. The artwork invites us to consider the weight of Victorian expectations on the personal, and how a single secret can unravel an entire household.
See it in person
Past and Present, No. 2 is in the collection of Tate Britain on Millbank, London — free to enter. Point your phone at any artwork there and audioguide.london plays a free audio guide in six languages — no app download needed.
