The Book of Art for Young PeopleConway, Agnes Ethel
General
The Book of Art for Young People
Conway, Agnes Ethel
Art -- Juvenile literature; Painting
Rossetti and Burne-Jones, indeed, never formally joined the
Brotherhood, though they were influenced by its ideals and pursued
the same strict fidelity to nature in all the accessories of a picture.
Millais and Holman Hunt, original members of the Brotherhood, painted
men and women of the mid-Victorian epoch with every detail of their
peaked bonnets and plaid shawls, and were comparatively indifferent
to beauty of form and face. But Rossetti and Burne-Jones created a
type of ideal beauty which they employed on their canvases with
persistent repetition. Burne-Jones founded his type upon the angels
of Botticelli, and his drapery is like that of the ring of dancers
in the sky in our picture of the 'Nativity.' You are probably familiar
with some of his pictures and perhaps have felt the spell of his pure
gem-like colouring and pale, haunting faces. It was the people of their
minds' eye who sat beside their easels. Rossetti lived and worked in
the romantic mood of a Giorgione, but instead of expressing the
atmosphere of his fairy city of Venice, he created one as far as
possible removed from his own mid-Victorian surroundings. His
imaginary world was peopled by women with pale faces and luxuriant
auburn hair, pondering upon the mysteries of the universe. Like
Rossetti's 'Blessed Damozel,' they look out from the gold bar of heaven
with eyes from which the wonder is not yet gone.
One of the best Pre-Raphaelite landscapes is the 'Strayed Sheep' of
Holman Hunt. The sheep are wandering over a grass hillside of the
vividest green, shot with spring flowers, and every sheep is painted
with the detail of the central sheep in Hubert van Eyck's 'Adoration
of the Lamb.' The colouring is almost as bright and jewel-like as that
of the fifteenth-century painters, for one of the theories of the
Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood was that grass should be painted as green
as the single blade--not the colour of the whole field seen immersed
in light and atmosphere, which can make green grass seem gray or even
blue.
In Brett's 'Val d'Aosta,' another Pre-Raphaelite landscape, we look
from a hill upon a great expanse of valley with mountains rising behind.
Every field of corn and every grassy meadow is outlined as clearly
as it would be upon a map. Every stick can be counted in the fences
between the fields and every tree in the hedge-rows. When we look at
the picture we involuntarily wander over the face of the country. There
is no taking in the view at a glance; we must walk through every field
and along every path.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
Reviews
Reviews
No reviews yet
Be the first to share your thoughts on this work.
Elsewhere in the archive
Join the Discussion
Join the discussion
Sign in to leave a comment or review.
Sign InorCreate an account