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| WASHINGTON — If “Pre-Raphaelites: Victorian Art and Design” at the National Gallery of Art were a theme-park ride, you would be strenuously exhorted to buckle up and hold on tight. Devoted to England’s ever-popular mid-19th-century art movement, the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood, and its followers, this exhibition is full of jolts and thrills that feel intense but never go very deep. | WASHINGTON — If “Pre-Raphaelites: Victorian Art and Design” at the National Gallery of Art were a theme-park ride, you would be strenuously exhorted to buckle up and hold on tight. Devoted to England’s ever-popular mid-19th-century art movement, the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood, and its followers, this exhibition is full of jolts and thrills that feel intense but never go very deep. |
| You won’t see much in the way of great paintings, but you will probably have a great — which is to say, entertaining and edifying — time. Perhaps inadvertently this show usefully parses the difference between quality and influence, reveals much about visual culture today and even provides a yardstick by which to gauge your own sophistication. | You won’t see much in the way of great paintings, but you will probably have a great — which is to say, entertaining and edifying — time. Perhaps inadvertently this show usefully parses the difference between quality and influence, reveals much about visual culture today and even provides a yardstick by which to gauge your own sophistication. |
| If you are genuinely interested in art and emerge from this show thinking that you have seen scores of outstanding paintings, you should spend more time studying other examples. For comparison the galleries adjacent to this exhibition contain two outstanding works by the Pre-Raphaelites’ French contemporaries, Eduard Manet’s “Dead Toreador” (probably 1864) and Paul Cézanne’s portrait of his father reading a newspaper (1866). Consider the simplicity, directness and mysteries of these paintings against the moralizing and endless intricacies of the Pre-Raphaelites. It is a contrast between the complex and the merely complicated. | If you are genuinely interested in art and emerge from this show thinking that you have seen scores of outstanding paintings, you should spend more time studying other examples. For comparison the galleries adjacent to this exhibition contain two outstanding works by the Pre-Raphaelites’ French contemporaries, Eduard Manet’s “Dead Toreador” (probably 1864) and Paul Cézanne’s portrait of his father reading a newspaper (1866). Consider the simplicity, directness and mysteries of these paintings against the moralizing and endless intricacies of the Pre-Raphaelites. It is a contrast between the complex and the merely complicated. |
| Pre-Raphaelite art is a volatile, highly complicated mixture of questionable intentions, literary erudition, ironclad nostalgia, meticulous realism, lavish costumes and a prescient technicolor palette. The brotherhood was formed in 1848 by William Holman Hunt, John Everett Millais and Dante Gabriel Rossetti, three disgruntled students at the Royal Academy of Art. Barely 20, they were repelled by the decadence of art and society, much of which they ascribed to the Industrial Revolution. | Pre-Raphaelite art is a volatile, highly complicated mixture of questionable intentions, literary erudition, ironclad nostalgia, meticulous realism, lavish costumes and a prescient technicolor palette. The brotherhood was formed in 1848 by William Holman Hunt, John Everett Millais and Dante Gabriel Rossetti, three disgruntled students at the Royal Academy of Art. Barely 20, they were repelled by the decadence of art and society, much of which they ascribed to the Industrial Revolution. |
| They wanted to turn back the clock to purer, more thoroughly Christian times, before High Renaissance artists like Raphael started confusing things by adding classicizing Greco-Roman elements to art. They were greatly inspired by the Gothic Revival, spawned largely by the writing and architecture of A. W. N. Pugin, who was by then working himself to death designing and building the neo-Gothic Houses of Parliament. (He died in 1852 at the age of 40.) | They wanted to turn back the clock to purer, more thoroughly Christian times, before High Renaissance artists like Raphael started confusing things by adding classicizing Greco-Roman elements to art. They were greatly inspired by the Gothic Revival, spawned largely by the writing and architecture of A. W. N. Pugin, who was by then working himself to death designing and building the neo-Gothic Houses of Parliament. (He died in 1852 at the age of 40.) |
| The three founding artists formed a nucleus with Ford Madox Brown, a slightly older proto-Pre-Raphaelite painter, and later, Edward Burne-Jones. They produced some of art’s most overwrought paintings in terms of emotion, narration and craft. Conjuring a world where women, whether chaste or fallen, dead or alive, are impossibly beautiful, these works laboriously spell out tales from the Bible, Shakespeare, English poetry, mythology, world history and Arthurian legend, striving nearly always to impose a supremely male-dominated sense of morality. They pile symbol upon symbol, detail upon detail and bright color upon color until the eyes beg for mercy. Does Rossetti’s rendition of the wedding of St. George and Princess Sabra really have to include the dragon from which he rescued her, dead in a coffin with a spear through its head? | The three founding artists formed a nucleus with Ford Madox Brown, a slightly older proto-Pre-Raphaelite painter, and later, Edward Burne-Jones. They produced some of art’s most overwrought paintings in terms of emotion, narration and craft. Conjuring a world where women, whether chaste or fallen, dead or alive, are impossibly beautiful, these works laboriously spell out tales from the Bible, Shakespeare, English poetry, mythology, world history and Arthurian legend, striving nearly always to impose a supremely male-dominated sense of morality. They pile symbol upon symbol, detail upon detail and bright color upon color until the eyes beg for mercy. Does Rossetti’s rendition of the wedding of St. George and Princess Sabra really have to include the dragon from which he rescued her, dead in a coffin with a spear through its head? |
| At once hysterical and inert, these paintings are fascinating as artifacts, period pieces reflective of their time. If you want a clear idea about what was rotten as opposed to enlightened about Victorian England, look no further. | At once hysterical and inert, these paintings are fascinating as artifacts, period pieces reflective of their time. If you want a clear idea about what was rotten as opposed to enlightened about Victorian England, look no further. |
| This is the largest Pre-Raphaelite exhibition in several decades, and its eight densely filled galleries are close to exhausting. Although Millais, Holman Hunt, Rossetti, Brown and Burne-Jones made about 50 of the paintings here, the show includes works by nearly two dozen other painters and a few photographers, including Julia Margaret Cameron. | This is the largest Pre-Raphaelite exhibition in several decades, and its eight densely filled galleries are close to exhausting. Although Millais, Holman Hunt, Rossetti, Brown and Burne-Jones made about 50 of the paintings here, the show includes works by nearly two dozen other painters and a few photographers, including Julia Margaret Cameron. |
| One gallery is devoted primarily to the designs of William Morris, another late joiner, who went on to found the Arts and Crafts movement. It contains medieval furniture painted with medieval scenes by Burne-Jones and two immense tapestries depicting the quest for the Holy Grail designed by Burne-Jones and woven in Morris’s workshops. Along with one devoted to landscapes and close-up images of nature, this gallery is the least oppressive in the show. | One gallery is devoted primarily to the designs of William Morris, another late joiner, who went on to found the Arts and Crafts movement. It contains medieval furniture painted with medieval scenes by Burne-Jones and two immense tapestries depicting the quest for the Holy Grail designed by Burne-Jones and woven in Morris’s workshops. Along with one devoted to landscapes and close-up images of nature, this gallery is the least oppressive in the show. |
| Elsewhere many of the landmarks of the movement are on hand. Some are quite famous, like Millais’s depiction of Shakespeare’s drowned Ophelia, a pale dark-haired lovely floating in a stream beside a grassy bank whose plants are exhaustively accounted for. Equally well known are the portraits of sultry, big-boned russet-haired beauties, usually based on Jane Burden, Morris’s wife, and possibly Rossetti’s lover. There’s also the show’s over-the-top finale, Holman Hunt’s “Lady of Shalott” (1888 to 1905) with its ponderous gold frame, swirling hair and embroidery thread and hot pinks and blues — a late work that would probably be a national treasure were it owned by a British museum instead of an American one. | Elsewhere many of the landmarks of the movement are on hand. Some are quite famous, like Millais’s depiction of Shakespeare’s drowned Ophelia, a pale dark-haired lovely floating in a stream beside a grassy bank whose plants are exhaustively accounted for. Equally well known are the portraits of sultry, big-boned russet-haired beauties, usually based on Jane Burden, Morris’s wife, and possibly Rossetti’s lover. There’s also the show’s over-the-top finale, Holman Hunt’s “Lady of Shalott” (1888 to 1905) with its ponderous gold frame, swirling hair and embroidery thread and hot pinks and blues — a late work that would probably be a national treasure were it owned by a British museum instead of an American one. |
| There are also works less familiar to the non-British, like Millais’s “Christ in the House of His Parents,” a light-bathed depiction of Mary tending to Jesus after he cuts himself while helping Joseph in his carpentry shop, the bloodied scratch on his palm foreshadowing the stigmata. | There are also works less familiar to the non-British, like Millais’s “Christ in the House of His Parents,” a light-bathed depiction of Mary tending to Jesus after he cuts himself while helping Joseph in his carpentry shop, the bloodied scratch on his palm foreshadowing the stigmata. |
| When first exhibited this painting stirred outrage for depicting Jesus as a gawky child in humble working-class circumstances. This helped put the Pre-Raphaelites on the map, as did their shockingly bright color, inspired by medieval stained glass. | When first exhibited this painting stirred outrage for depicting Jesus as a gawky child in humble working-class circumstances. This helped put the Pre-Raphaelites on the map, as did their shockingly bright color, inspired by medieval stained glass. |
| When it made its debut at Tate Britain in London, this show was bluntly titled “Pre-Raphaelites: Victorian Avant-Garde.” Perhaps the title was dialed back for non-British audiences, but the mission remains, in the words of the catalog, to establish the Pre-Raphaelites as “an avant-garde movement” whose efforts in numerous mediums “constitute a major contribution to the history of modern art.” | When it made its debut at Tate Britain in London, this show was bluntly titled “Pre-Raphaelites: Victorian Avant-Garde.” Perhaps the title was dialed back for non-British audiences, but the mission remains, in the words of the catalog, to establish the Pre-Raphaelites as “an avant-garde movement” whose efforts in numerous mediums “constitute a major contribution to the history of modern art.” |
| That the Pre-Raphaelites rebelled against their own time and introduced a hyper-realistic style does not necessarily make them avant-garde. They didn’t radically rethink painting as Manet, Cézanne or van Gogh did; inspired by photography, they just made it more precise, often extraordinarily so. And they had only a minor interest in being “painters of modern life,” to use Baudelaire’s phrase. Rather than embracing the people, fashions and activities of their time, as their French contemporaries did, they escaped into fantasy. | That the Pre-Raphaelites rebelled against their own time and introduced a hyper-realistic style does not necessarily make them avant-garde. They didn’t radically rethink painting as Manet, Cézanne or van Gogh did; inspired by photography, they just made it more precise, often extraordinarily so. And they had only a minor interest in being “painters of modern life,” to use Baudelaire’s phrase. Rather than embracing the people, fashions and activities of their time, as their French contemporaries did, they escaped into fantasy. |
| The Pre-Raphaelites were most modern in their treatment of landscape, which they rendered en plein air in advance of the Impressionsts (but not before Corot or Constable). Sometimes they even populated these works with people in contemporary dress, like the family gathering seashells in William Dyce’s 1858 “Pegwell Bay, Kent — A Recollection of October 5th 1858” or the boy and girl lounging on a hillside in Brown’s panoramic “English Autumn Afternoon, Hampstead — Scenery in 1853,” whose view of London in the distance even intimates the modern city. | The Pre-Raphaelites were most modern in their treatment of landscape, which they rendered en plein air in advance of the Impressionsts (but not before Corot or Constable). Sometimes they even populated these works with people in contemporary dress, like the family gathering seashells in William Dyce’s 1858 “Pegwell Bay, Kent — A Recollection of October 5th 1858” or the boy and girl lounging on a hillside in Brown’s panoramic “English Autumn Afternoon, Hampstead — Scenery in 1853,” whose view of London in the distance even intimates the modern city. |
| But unlike the Impressionists or the Cubists the Pre-Raphaelites did not stop art in its tracks, even if they were admired by Picasso during his Blue Period, Salvador Dalí and Wassily Kandinsky. Nor does it explain much to note that the art historian Robert Rosenblum capriciously likened the busy composition and shallow space of Holman Hunt’s mawkish “Awakening Conscience” (1853) — in which a kept woman sees the light of salvation and rises from the lap of her lover — to the allover skeins of Jackson Pollock’s abstractions. The same goes for speculation that the last big Pre-Raphaelite show at the Tate in 1984 may have influenced the emergence of the Young British Artists in the late 1980s. | But unlike the Impressionists or the Cubists the Pre-Raphaelites did not stop art in its tracks, even if they were admired by Picasso during his Blue Period, Salvador Dalí and Wassily Kandinsky. Nor does it explain much to note that the art historian Robert Rosenblum capriciously likened the busy composition and shallow space of Holman Hunt’s mawkish “Awakening Conscience” (1853) — in which a kept woman sees the light of salvation and rises from the lap of her lover — to the allover skeins of Jackson Pollock’s abstractions. The same goes for speculation that the last big Pre-Raphaelite show at the Tate in 1984 may have influenced the emergence of the Young British Artists in the late 1980s. |
| But all this is small beer. The Pre-Raphaelites’ influence is far more widespread than that of most art movements. You can see it in the aesthetic movement Symbolism, Art Nouveau and modern design (thanks to Morris); in children’s books and Photo Realism; and in all kinds of contemporary art. Examples include Tom Uttech’s dreamlike views of wilderness (on view through Saturday in a terrific show at the Alexandre Gallery on 57th Street in Manhattan), Ellen Altfest’s detailed yet painterly realism, Ron Mueck‘s disturbingly lifelike sculptures, Mark Greenwold‘s intricately twisted narratives and the equally finicky if more surreal images of Anj Smith. | But all this is small beer. The Pre-Raphaelites’ influence is far more widespread than that of most art movements. You can see it in the aesthetic movement Symbolism, Art Nouveau and modern design (thanks to Morris); in children’s books and Photo Realism; and in all kinds of contemporary art. Examples include Tom Uttech’s dreamlike views of wilderness (on view through Saturday in a terrific show at the Alexandre Gallery on 57th Street in Manhattan), Ellen Altfest’s detailed yet painterly realism, Ron Mueck‘s disturbingly lifelike sculptures, Mark Greenwold‘s intricately twisted narratives and the equally finicky if more surreal images of Anj Smith. |
| Tracing things in another direction the Pre-Raphaelites seem to have made some of the first so-bad-it’s-maybe-good modern art. Fighting Victorian decadence with more Victorian decadence, they may also have contributed to the onset of kitsch. Cézanne and Manet are great artists, necessary to many people’s lives, but when you start to look around, the Pre-Raphaelites are everywhere. That’s why this show is so hypnotic. The badness at its core is completely familiar; it permeates our lives. Looking at these paintings you can see it all coming: Maxfield Parrish’s jocular King Cole mural at the St. Regis Hotel in Manhattan; the visual platitudes of Norman Rockwell and Walt Disney; the hallucinatory brightness of psychedelic posters, the sugary scenes of Thomas Kinkade and the heavy-handed neo-medievalism of countless movies and television shows, most recently “Game of Thrones.” | |
| The Pre-Raphaelites built one of the cornerstones of popular culture. Like kitsch itself their art is radioactive; for better and for worse its influence never goes away, it only spreads. | The Pre-Raphaelites built one of the cornerstones of popular culture. Like kitsch itself their art is radioactive; for better and for worse its influence never goes away, it only spreads. |
“Pre-Raphaelites: Victorian Art and Design, 1848 to 1900” is on view through May 19 at the National Gallery of Art, on the National Mall between Third and Seventh Streets NW, Washington, (202) 737-4215; nga.gov. | “Pre-Raphaelites: Victorian Art and Design, 1848 to 1900” is on view through May 19 at the National Gallery of Art, on the National Mall between Third and Seventh Streets NW, Washington, (202) 737-4215; nga.gov. |
| This article has been revised to reflect the following correction: | |
| Correction: March 29, 2013 | |
An earlier version of this review misspelled the surname of an artist whose work was cited as an example of the kitsch to which the Pre-Raphaelites may have contributed. He was Thomas Kinkade, not Kincaid. |