What is the girl called in Windflowers by John William Waterhouse?

Question

Please no guesses, if she doesn't have a name, what do you think she would be called?

Answer 1

Waterhouse was a very private man and little is known about his models, other than family members. Additionally, it is believed that he often painted this version of an 'ideal' woman - an amalgamation of his favourite features and not a specific model.

 

The following links are very interesting and should give you a good deal of information as to who the candidates are:

http://wn.com/The_Waterhouse_Family

(there are two videos on this website of use - if you look to the list on the right hand side -The Mysterious Models of John William Waterhouse, parts 1 and 2).

 

This link also very useful http://www.johnwilliamwaterhouse.com/m/a…

 

My own opinion is that the girl in Windflowers is most likely (given the dates) Ethel Bantock, his 'Echo' or possibly Mary Waterhouse (his Lady of Shalott) or Muriel Foster (his Lamia)...but it is hard to distinguish as he does give all his models a certain 'look'. Boreas, which has the same model features is believed to be one of Waterhouse's invented ideals, so Windflowers probably is too.

Answer 2

I am not really sure if you mean 1.) the model or 2.) the figure that was depicted.

Regarding 1.): not much is known about Waterhouse's models as they are barely mentioned in any of his notes.

Regading 2.): To me "Windflowers" looks like it is linked to the later piece "Boreas" (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Boreas… Boreas being the Greek god of the cold north wind and bringer of winter, I guess that "Windflowers" deals with Zephyrus, god of the west wind and bringer of spring. 

Zephyrus's wife was Chloris (also known as Flora).

 

tl;dr: I think she'd be called Flora :-)

Source(s):

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chloris

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anemoi