Edyth Starkie

Edyth Starkie (27 November 1867 – March 1941) was an established Irish portrait painter who was married to Arthur Rackham.

The youngest of six, she spent most of her youth at Creggane Manor, Rosscarbery, near Cork where her father, William Robert Starkie JP (1824–1897), was a resident magistrate, who had also taught himself to play the violin.

[1] Her youthful behavior was said to be so wild and outrageous that at Mass in Skibbereen the parish priest denounced her, along with her cousin Fanny, from the pulpit.

In Cassel, Edyth became engaged to a Prussian officer, Colonel von W-, at Potsdam,[5] causing a major scandal when she finally broke it off because she couldn't stand the stiff Prussian attitudes; her fiancé would insist on challenging any man whom Edyth so much as smiled at in the street to a duel.

Their personalities: Edyth was quizzical, ironic, and imaginative like the Irish; Arthur was prim, precise, and very English in manner.

[11] Starkie was a member of the International Society; her exhibitions at the Royal Academy of Arts in London included Lilla (1897), St. Cecilia (1898), and Pippa Passes (1899).