Painted in 1904, ‘The Pink Bodice’ is the original of 4 works in Roger Langley’s Catalogue Raisonné for his grandfather Walter, by that title. The pink bodice or blouse appears modelled in many Langley paintings including ‘When the Boats are Away’ – his Royal Academy oil from the previous year of 1903. That RA painting features the same two elderly models that we observe in the background of The Pink Bodice. Roger Langley tells us that Tessa Sidley recalled that the blouse belonged to a Mrs Tregurtha of Newlyn and was originally white, but accidently died pink. As that colour didn’t suit Mrs Tregurtha’s complexion, she gifted the garment to Langley for the use of his female models. It clearly was a favourite prop for the artist as he used it until at least 1916, although it seems unlikely it was the same pink shirt throughout!

The Pink Bodice was painted in 1904, likely before July when Langley departed for his first Dutch painting trip. The work is one of Walter’s more joyous; the young subject caught in a reverie as she repairs a little stitching in the garment; a couple of torn quilts draped over the iron railing await her attention. Given the location, the 2 elderly folk in the background and the old fish wife’s empty basket, it seems quite likely that the subjects are awaiting the return of the fishing boats, their loved ones, and a hoped-for catch.

The Pink Bodice has many similarities with the subject matter of A Cornish Idyll (1902 - Walker Art Gallery); which pictures a young woman also on a Newlyn quayside, this time actually wearing the pink bodice and sowing one of the same quilts later seen in our work.  And Between the Tides (1901, Warrington Museum and Art Gallery), which again presents a young woman in the pink bodice, on the same quayside as that seen in our painting, with the old fish wife with fish basket towards the end of the quay. 

The Pink Bodice is a wonderful en plein air composition which typifies the artist's lighter and brighter subject matter at the start of the new century. A crisp and vibrant painting set on the Newlyn quayside above the beach, the South Pier and lighthouse, built in 1886, and part of the Newlyn fishing fleet, tied up, with gulls following the one moving boat with sail still hoisted. In the foreground two baskets draped with fishing nets and a large terracotta jug of water, to quench the thirst of a returning fisherman, complete the scene rich in Newlyn School iconography. As ever with Langley paintings it is helpful to remember the Victorian, and in this case Edwardian audience that the work is intended for and the messages, subtle, emotional and more tangible, that Langley seeks to convey about this westernmost outpost of the British Isles.