Power of Music

A letter written by the artist to William Walters dated July 20, 1860 illuminates the subject of this painting. It shows a brother and sister resting before an old tomb. The brother is attempting to comfort his sibling by playing the violin, and she has fallen into a deep sleep, "oblivious of all grief, mental and physical."

This composition exists in at least one other version, now preserved at the Hermitage Museum in St. Petersburg. A closely related reduced replica was given to the Musées royaux des Beaux-Arts de Belgique by a descendant of the artist. The melancholic subject's popularity is attested by its reproduction on a porcelain plaque manufactured by the Royal Porcelain Factory, Berlin.