Gilbert Canaan at His Mill (1916)
by Mark Gertler
Gertler (1891 - 1939) was an English painter, primarily of portraits and still lifes. His painting here is of Gilbert Canaan, the English writer who had an affair with and later married Mary Ansell, the English actress first married to J. M. Barrie, the creator of Peter Pan. When Barrie and Ansell divorced, she went to live with Canaan and took with her Luath, the Landseer Newfoundland who served as the inspiration for Nana, the caretaking Newfoundland in the Peter Pan stories. Luath is (loosely) depicted in this paiting.