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The Awakening Conscience Centrally placed, a woman rises from the lap of her companion. She wears a long white dress with large lace trimming at the bottom hemline. Pink cloth edges her neckline. A paisley shawl, draped at her mid section, is tied in the front. The woman’s hands are clasped in front of her. Her body assumes a slightly bent position as she rises. Her wide opened eyes look out to the distance, therefore out of the compositional space. The gentleman, wearing a dark suit, reclines on the chair. His outstretched arm encircles the standing woman. His right hand, beneath the woman’s clasped hands, is outstretched as well. The gentleman looks surprised as he gazes at the woman - she does not return his look. Luxurious furnishings in a well-appropriated sitting room surround the couple. They sit at an upright piano, sheet music opened on the ledge. A domed clock rests on top of the piano. A round wooden table is placed to the left of the couple. A cat sits underneath, and does a blue cloth wrapping that holds a newspaper. Decorative patterns abound in the wall coverings and the red carpet. A large mirror fills the left quarter of the composition. Reflections in the mirror include the couple, as well as paintings that adorn the walls. An open window takes up a large portion of the reflection. The sun glistens on the golden leaves outside. Background This painting attracted my eye initially because of the artist’s inclusion of a centrally placed Paisley shawl. That the woman happened to be wearing the Paisley shawl allowed me to further delve into the Why. Interpreted, this painting indicates a woman’s awakening to her current social standing. All of the woman’s material needs, especially the luxurious interior furnishings and her apparel, have been provided by her gentleman companion. They sit together playing the piano on a lovely afternoon. The woman’s other companion, her pet cat, rests coyly underneath the table. The woman has seen the light – especially of her situation. She gazes at the open window, the light, and in an instant has realized that her current situation is a false one. The viewer witnesses this epiphany. The gentleman companion, however, cannot. The Paisley shawl, whose very name became synonymous with the Scottish manufacturing town of Paisley, had it’s origins in English fashion trends in the mid18th Century. Administrators of the British East India Company, as well as British soldiers, brought back souvenirs for their loved ones from their travels and campaigns in the East. The shawl, decorated with paisley patterns, was a prized garment worn by men in Kashmir. In England, fashionable ladies took up this trend, and within a short time the East India Company began to import the shawls commercially. Demand started to exceed the supply, and the textile manufacturing industry began to produce imitations of the prized Kashmir paisley shawl. Although a man’s garment, the draping shawl provided a contrast with the straight lines of early 19th Century woman’s fashionable dresses. The Paisley shawl’s popularity in English fashion waxed and waned in the early part of the 19th Century. Fashion trends, and the development of the Jacquard loom for patterns allowed for continued production of the shawl itself, and manufacture went from a highly respected cottage industry to a well defined manufacturing system, still within the confines of a cottage workshop. Four to six weavers worked together in a workshop that produced Paisley shawls on Jacquard looms. Choosing this painting as a focal point for paintings about the Industrial Revolution in Great Britain, I too saw the light. The Paisley shawl became an indication of a women’s knowledge of contemporary fashion, as well as an indicator of the industry that grew up around it. A fashion trend drove the industry, and in the case of Paisley Scotland, became synonymous with its name. People gaze at it in a blank wonder, and leave it hopelessly; so that, thoughit is amost an insult to the painter to explain his thoughts in this instance, I cannot persuade myself to leave it thus misunderstood. The poor girl has been sitting singing with her seducer; some chance words of the song, ‘Oft in the stilly night,’ have struck upon the numbed places of her heart; she has started up in agony. He, not seeing her face, goes on singing, striking the keys carelessly with his gloved hand.
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