Pandora, 1896
Oil on canvas, 152.4 × 91.4 cm Collection Lord Lloyd-Webber
Although J. W. Waterhouse was painting his masterpieces almost 50 years after the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood was formed (he was born in Rome the year after the PRB’s first meeting), that he took great inspiration from their work is unquestionable. It was he who ‘kept the sacred flame of the Pre-Raphaelitism burning into
the next century’, as the Victorian art writer Christopher Wood so
romantically puts it.
Like the Brotherhood,Waterhouse had a passion for essentially Romantic subjects.He often took his themes from Greek mythology, and then infused these dramas with a haunting sensuality. His female protagonists ‒ Ariadne, Psyche,Pandora ‒ beauties with a childlike innocence and vulnerability, are often seemingly powerless to prevent the terrible dramas that unfold before them.
Waterhouse had a huge following in his day, although
he was known to be a quiet and retiring man, who (rather like Arthur Hughes) was not especially ambitious. His extraordinary gift for combining romantic subjects from the past with a style which was perceived at the time as essentially modern was greatly admired; his reputation rivalled those Edward Coley Burne-Jones and Lord Leighton.I was introduced to ECB-J,JWW and the PRB early in my life and the passion has never left me .
Waterhouse’s childhood in Italy gave him a life-long love of classical subjects, but he also loved to paint subjects from the Romantic poets,such as the Keatsian theme of ‘La Belle Dame Sans Merci’.
La Belle Dame Sans Merci: A Ballad (John Keats)
1
Oh what can ail thee, knight at arms,
Alone and palely loitering?
The sedge has wither'd from the lake,
And no birds sing.
2
Oh what can ail thee, knight at arms,
So haggard adn so woe-begone?
The squirrel's granary is full,
And the harvest's done.
3
I see a lily on thy brow
With anguish moist and fever dew,
And on thy cheeks a fading rose
Fast withereth too.
4
I met a lady in the meads,
Full beautiful, a fairy's child;
Her hair was long, her foot was light,
And her eyes were wild.
5
I made a garland for her head,
And bracelets too, and fragrant zone;
She look'd at me as she did love,
And made sweet moan.
6
I set her on my pacing steed,
And nothing else saw all day long,
For sidelong would she bend, and sing
A fairy's song.
7
She found me roots of relish sweet,
And honey wild, and manna dew,
And sure in language strange she said--
I love thee true.
8
She took me to her elfin grot,
And there she wept, and sigh'd full sore,
And there I shut her wild wild eyes
With kisses four.
9
And there she lulled me asleep,
And there I dream'd--Ah! woe betide!
The latest dream I ever dream'd
On the cold hill's side.
10
I saw pale kings, and princes too,
Pale warriors, death pale were they all;
They cried--"La belle dame sans merci
Hath thee in thrall!"
11
I saw their starv'd lips in the gloam
With horrid warning gaped wide,
And I awoke and found me here
On the cold hill's side.
12
And this is why I sojourn here,
Alone and palely loitering,
Though the sedge is wither'd from the lake,
And no birds sing.
This tells the the story of a beautiful woman who bewitches a passing knight.
In the knight’s dreams he sees the gaunt spectres of other souls she has enthralled, who shout him a warning, but too late...
Waterhouse painted several versions of the Pandora myth, which is told in Heywood’s History of Women as follows:
Tomorrow on English television is the start of a series showing
Lord Andrew Weber's amazing collection of PRB paintings..
He sits at his piano surrounded by these ethereal works of art. I'm afraid I just don't understand how this produces musical theatre !
Let there be Light .......
Phosphorus and Hesperus by Evelyn De Morgan, 1889
De Morgan was a pioneering woman artist who was born in 1855. Her work is Pre-Raphaelite and she was influenced by her uncle Roddam Stanhope and Edward Poynter. She died in 1919 one of the most renowned of women artists in the world.
Hesperus in Greek mythology was the son of Eos and Atlas and was associated with the evening star, Venus. In its morning aspect, the planet we know as Venus was known to the Greeks as Phosphorus, the bringer of light.
In some mythological stories, these two male figures were considered to be lovers. The original of this painting is in the De Morgan Foundation in Battersea, London.
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