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A sentimental picture of a mother holding an infant up to a picture of its father is
captioned with the following lines from Alfred, Lord Tennyson’s famous poem Break,
Break, Break:
O for the touch of a vanish’d hand
And the sound of a voice that is still
The elegy was written in the early 1830s after the death of Arthur Henry Hallam, a close
friend and fellow poet. The poem evokes feelings of loss, nostalgia and loneliness.
NUDES
A series of Edwardian studio studies of nudes are displayed in this room and in the
adjoining bedroom. According to Helen’s niece Betty Crous, her mother Alida, aunt
Annie and Helen experimented with nude photography, copying the poses assumed
by the professional models.
Curiously, nude studies were acceptable in Victorian England, a cultural influence
on the Cape of Helen’s childhood. Greek nude sculptures were considered to be the
ultimate expression of beauty, making it acceptable within limits. However, it would
have been beyond the pale to most rural Calvinist Afrikaners at the time.
142 FOR THE LOVE OF LIGHT
FOR THE LOVE OF LIGHT 143