The Cadence of Autumn 1905

Evelyn De Morgan painted ‘The Cadence of Autumn’ with oil on canvas, but the date is unknown. Her application is thin and transparent, almost like watercolor. She’s clearly concerned with surface, with building up layers of glazes to create a luminous, jewel-like quality. Look at the way the figures’ draperies flow and swirl around their bodies. The way the paint is handled here is really interesting to me. De Morgan has created a sense of depth and movement through her brushwork, which gives a tangible presence to these figures. This piece reminds me of earlier Pre-Raphaelite painters like Burne-Jones, but De Morgan is definitely her own artist. She uses color and light in a really distinctive way, to create an atmosphere that's both ethereal and grounded in the physical world. And, like all great art, this piece is full of ambiguity, leaving us space to project our own interpretations and experiences onto it.