The Haunted Portrait
Amazing happenings at art school
Picture of a dead girl which refuses to remain in its frame
From our own correspondent, London, Tuesday.
A psychic manifestation is said to be the cause of a curious incident at Heatherleys Art School, London, where the picture of a fascinating young art student who died not long ago in tragic circumstances refuses to remain in its frame – a type of frame, by the way, which the girl, now dead, had always abhorred.
Mrs Massey, the wife of the principal of the school, said to me today that the peculiar part of the affair is that the picture, when placed in the frame, cannot be withdrawn until the frame is removed at least four inches away from the wall; yet, on four separate occasions, after being placed in its position before the school was closed for the day, the picture was found next morning on the floor and the frame in its original position intact. “I can understand the phenomenon,” said Mrs Massey, “because I am interested in psychology myself, and so was the young lady who was the subject of the picture. She was a very intelligent girl, and studed psychological matters very closely. After her death we found her portrait in the studio, and, having a frame that exactly fitted the picture, we fixed the latter in it. It is a frame specially manufactured for war memorial pictures. The frame has a slot in it to hold the canvas stretcher and was fitted into a niche on the wall so that it was held flush with the plaster.
“The first time we found the picture on the floor we thought it had been carelessly fixed and that it had dropped out on that account. On the second occasion we carefully tested the frame and found that, as I say, it had to be pulled four inches away from the wall in order to get the picture out of it. Four times we placed it in the frame and each time we found it on the floor again.
“After this we began to think and remembered that the girl had said that she wished her portrait would never be placed in one of those memorial frames. She did not like them, she declared. I feel sure that the intention of the manifestation is clear and we have not placed the picture in the frame again. It is now hung elsewhere.”
Liverpool Echo, 8th December 1925.
Haunted picture frame.
Mystery of a dead girl’s portrait.
Falls four times.
The death of a beautiful young art student in tragic circumstances has been followed by a series of startling happenings at a famous London art school. “The student was a lovely, distinguished-looking girl, and a great favourite,” said Mrs Massey, the artist wife of the principal of Heatherley’s Art School, to a “Daily Express” representative. “While she was studying at the school my husband painted her portrait. Soon afterwards we had news of her death alone in her studio after a few tragic days of illness. Now comes the curious side of the story. Her portrait was still at the school, and among our frames we have one that was specially designed for war memorial portraits. As her portrait exactly fitted into this frame we placed the picture in it. This frame itself has a deep slot to hold the canvas stretcher, and unless the frame is pulled about four inches away from the wall the picture cannot be taken out. It is fixed in a niche and is flush with the wall. The framed picture had only been hung a short time when we noticed the picture lying on the floor, the frame still being in its original position on the wall.
“Thinking that we had been careless in putting the picture into the frame we re-framed it, taking special care that it was firmly fixed. A few mornings afterwards when the studio door was unlocked we again found the portrait on the floor – and the frame on the wall. Then we tested it, and found the frame had to be pulled out at least four inches from the wall to get the picture out. In fact, it needed two movements; one to pull the frame away from the wall and another to move the portrait out of its niche in the frame.
“We began to think it odd, and once again for the third time we fixed the picture firmly and hung the frame as closely and securely to the wall as we could. For some days the portrait remained in the frame. Then one morning when I came to the studio with my housekeeper, she turned to me with rather a scared expression and said ‘That picture is on the floor again. She always did say she hated those memorial frames.’ The empty frame was on the wall untouched.
“Then I remembered that I, too, had heard the student say: ‘Do not ever put my picture into one of those memorial frames. I do not like them.’ Since then the memorial frame has been empty.”
Daily Express, 8th December 1925.