Flower Crowned Girl

In both substance and style, this hand-signed lithograph on paper signals a major crossroads in Madge Tennent’s career. As World War II raged on and supplies grew scarce, she shifted from large paintings on canvas or board to smaller works on paper. Executed across a wide variety of media and techniques, these works exhibit an economy and eloquence of line and form. Emphasis is placed on enlarged, heavy-lidded, soulful eyes, and lips that the artist once described as “rhythmically classic, shaped like a bird’s wing bent down in flight.” Tennent likely derived these pleasing features and proportions from portraits of Hawaiian royalty, particularly the multiethnic princesses of the later 19th century. When the war ended, Madge Tennent mounted this entrancing work in her celebrated "Hawaiians for Victory" exhibition in honor of her younger son, Val, who fought in the Army Air Corps.