THE MIDDLE OF THE XIXTH CENTURY. THE SEARCH FOR THE NEW IN THE OLD
The second half of the nineteenth century has been described by a number of critics as a period of stagnation in English painting. The same view was held by a very popular group of young artists who in the late 40s organised the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood. Its members called for a rejection of the dead traditions, conventions and academicism of modern art and for a return to the direct and sincere painting of the period 'before Raphael'.
In the work of the Brotherhood's members one can clearly see the desire to follow the canons of the early Renaissance. This was expressed in everything from the subject matter, the manner of painting with particular attention to detail and the intimate study of colour, to the demand to paint only from life on canvas at once. They even tried to use medieval recipes for their canvases and paints.
The young painters' rebellion against the canon and their courage soon met with rejection from the primitive near-artistic community. The active support of the established critic John Ruskin, however, changed the attitude of amateur painters to the Brotherhood.
The Brotherhood's most notable figures were Dante Gabriel Rossetti (1828-1882) and John Everett Millais (1829-1896). Millais' Death of Ophelia and the numerous portraits of Rossetti's lover Jane Morris as the mythical Proserpine, Astarte, etc. are the most characteristic of the Brotherhood.