The Harbinger

76x102cm / 30×40” acrylic on wood panel, 2026

The Harbinger references both The Unicorn in Captivity from the Unicorn Tapestries, c. 1495-1505, as well as the white hart (stag) on the outer panel of the Wilton Diptych, c. 1395-1399.

“In Celtic mythology a white stag is often interpreted as the harbinger of death — that the Otherworld is near. In other myths, both pagan and Christian, the white stag is equated with the unicorn or…  a symbol of mankind’s elusive spiritual quest” (Burnett).

The white hart was the emblem of King Richard II of England. In the Wilton Diptych, “The stag is wearing a collar around his neck shaped like a crown with a chain dangling freely from it attached to nothing. In this we see Richard’s burden of kingship is both noble and enslaved. He is enslaved not by anyone in the visible realm, but in the invisible… Richard developed a concept of kingship as more of a priesthood, which emphasized that the office came to him by Divine call and right” (Weiner).

The robed figure holds up a mirror for the hart, in which he sees himself sans crown, a future he does not desire, for church & state are the oldest of bedfellows.

David Burnett, John William Waterhouse, The Mystic Wood, c. 1910, https://collection.qagoma.qld.gov.au/stories/1827

Rose Weiner, The Symbol of the Stag in Medieval England, https://weinermedia.com/the-symbol-of-the-stag-in-medieval-england/

PMD 2026