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Pre-Raphaelite Art and Design at the National Gallery, Washington

John Everett Millais - Ophelia, 1851-1852

John Everett Millais
Ophelia, 1851-1852
oil on canvas
Tate. Presented by Sir Henry Tate, 1894

Pre-Raphaelite Art and Design – NGA Washington On view from February 17 through May 19, 2013, at the National Gallery of Art, Washington, ‘Pre-Raphaelites: Victorian Art and Design, 1848–1900’ is the first major survey of the art of the Pre-Raphaelites to be shown in the United States.]]>

Source: National Gallery of Art, Washington

The exhibition features some 130 paintings, sculptures, photography, works on paper, and decorative art objects that reflect the ideals of Britain’s first modern art movement.

The Pre-Raphaelites rejected the rigid rules for painting that prevailed at the dawn of the Victorian era to launch Britain’s first avant-garde movement,” said Earl A. Powell III, director, National Gallery of Art. “We are thrilled to present this rare exhibition to our audiences and grateful to lenders, both public and private, as well as our generous sponsors.

The Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood (PRB) was founded in London in September 1848 at a turbulent time of political and social change. Many Victorians felt that beauty and spirituality had been lost amid industrialization.

The leading members of the PRB were the painters John Everett Millais, Dante Gabriel Rossetti and William Holman Hunt, young students at the Royal Academy of Arts. They all believed that art had become decadent, and rejected their teachers’ belief that the Italian artist Raphael (1483–1520) represented the pinnacle of aesthetic achievement. Instead, they looked to medieval and early Renaissance art for inspiration. Whether painting subjects from Shakespeare or the Bible, landscapes of the Alps, or the view from a back window, the Pre-Raphaelites brought a new sincerity and intensity to British art.

The exhibition is organized into eight themes: Beginnings, History, Literature and Medievalism, Salvation, Nature, Beauty, Paradise–Decorative Arts, and Mythologies. Highlights of the show include John Everett Millais’ “Ophelia” and Dante Gabriel Rossetti’s “Lady Lilith”.

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Pre-Raphaelites exhibition at Tate Britain (exhibition, 2012)

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Pre-Raphaelite Art and Design at the National Gallery, Washington