Helen Mabel Trevor

Helen Mabel Trevor (20 December 1831 – 3 April 1900) was an Irish landscape and genre painter.

Life Helen Mabel Trevor was born in Lisnagead House, Loughbrickland, County Down, on 20 December 1831. She was the eldest daughter of Edward Hill Trevor, Esq. Trevor began to draw at a young age, with her father providing her with a studio as encouragement. She left Ireland in the 1870s, with the income of the Loughbrickland estate funding her travels and studies until the 1890s. Trevor became deaf later in life, dying suddenly from a heart attack in her studio in Rue du Cherche Midi on 3 April 1900. She went on to submit again to the RHA in 1856 with works depicting a dog, a kitten and the hounds of the Newry Hunt, along with a portrait. In 1858 she submitted two paintings of dogs. Around 1880, Trevor moved to Paris and studied with Jean-Jacques Henner, Luc-Olivier Merson, and Carolus-Duran. She travelled with her sister Rose to Brittany and Normandy in 1881 and 1882. Her 1881 painting, Breton boys en retenue, was sent to the RA. Another work, Two Breton girls, probably dates from this time. Trevor starts to exhibit more realism with her 1883 piece A Breton widow, which was shown with the RHA in 1889. She spent time in Concarneau in 1883, where she possibly met the realist Jules Bastien-Lepage. The sisters moved to Italy in 1883, and stayed there for the next six years travelling and studying the Old Masters. Trevor continued to exhibit with the RHA, with 1888 works such as The hills of Perugia and Venetian beadstringers. and 1899 she was exhibited at the Paris Salon. Trevor remarked at her drop in rental income from her Irish property, but remained positive about her circumstances. Her 1898 work, Breton interior received an honourable mention. From 1889 to 1897, fourteen of her works were sent to the RHA, with others sent to the RA. An example of her later work are La mère du marin from 1892, which is reminiscent of Old woman gathering leaves (1887) by Frank O'Meara, a fellow pupil of Duran.

Trevor bequeathed two paintings to the National Gallery of Ireland (NGI), The Fisherman's Mother and Interior of a Breton Cottage, In 1959, the Ulster Museum purchased The young Eve (1882). Her letters to a friend, E. Halse, were published in 1901 under the title Ramblings of an artist.