Critical Art Midterm Essay The main focus is a young woman in the foreground, consuming about eighty percent of the painting, demanding your attention. She wears a rich, crimson red dress that covers every part of her body except her hands and head. At the collar and wrists, white fabric shows beneath the dress. It is adorned with a bow at the neck as wide as her head and five pleats that extend from the woman’s neck to her waist. Her dark, ash brown hair is held on the top of her head with a long, handle-like clip the color of chocolate and stands out compared to her porcelain colored skin and rosy cheeks. Perched on the woman’s lap is a golden colored embroidering stand. The part that touches her thighs is as wide as a lap top and extends off the sides of her legs ever so slightly. Attached to and extending upwards from the base are two poles that hold up the embroidery frame. The way the woman’s arms are angled and the positioning of her hands on either side of the mesh and her solemn face of deep concentration both suggest she is in the middle of sewing an intricate image. The young woman sits delicately at an angle to the right edge of the painting on a simple, straight back maple wooden chair with a velvet, emerald green cushion and back rest. Behind her right shoulder is a heavy pea green curtain blocking a third of the background. To the right of the curtain is a mustard yellow wall with four paintings hanging evenly spaced at eye level. Half hidden from view by the curtain is a vase the same color as the woman’s hair clip, sitting on a shelf just below a small, oval painting. The painting directly to the right of this one is a larger rectangular painting held up by a thick, brick red frame. The next painting is a small, square one in a yellow frame that almost blends into the wall. It is being looked at by two older gentlemen, both wearing black suit jackets and smoke grey slacks. The first is of medium build and has his hands placed gingerly in his pockets; his balding head alludes to his old age. The other man is farther back in the painting but stands to the right of the first one and is larger with silver colored hair in his beard and on his head. Behind the first gentleman’s head is the final painting on the wall. It is similar size as the second one and is in an egg shell white frame. Beneath the men’s feet is a scarlet carpet that has large, violet colored designs on it. The year is 1892, Christine just finished doing her various daily duties around the house and she now has the afternoon to herself. Even though she knows exactly what she would like to do with her time, she cannot do it. As her father would say, “It is simply unacceptable for a young woman to spend her free time held up in a library somewhere reading about science and things that don’t matter.” “What does he know,” she thinks as she walks away, he only cares about the latest art form. It was two years ago that Christine found an old science book in her grandfather’s house; the thing was thousands of pages and far beyond what is supposed to be her scope of intelligence, but she’s read it multiple times already. So, instead of soaking up more knowledge as she would like to, Christine sits in her father’s gallery and works on her embroidery while her father shows an admirer his latest collection of paintings. Her mother taught her how to do this and other domestic works such as quilting and sewing years ago and she has become quite excellent at it. Although her talent has grown, her interest has not. As she is embroidering, Christine dreams of a day when she is free to do whatever it is she wants to do. She sees herself in a small home somewhere in the country, where she can’t be bothered by all the people of the city. She would spend her days in a room filled with all kinds of books, from science and history to fantasy and fiction. Her children would run and play in her large back yard and at night she would teach them everything she